Bad
by kenzeaye
Summary: Post-series. The blows keep coming for a grieving, insomniac Spike as the ISSP plans to make an example of him to put an end to syndicate crime on Mars. A newly-motivated Faye hatches a scheme to help Spike (and herself, of course). Jet attempts to assist the pair meanwhile questioning the wisdom of his continued involvement in their lives. Language, violence, sexuality. SxF.
1. Prologue: Wish You Well

**Bad: Prologue**

_"I wish love, lord_  
><em>I wish love could live forever<em>  
><em>I'm burning bright as hell<br>__Here comes that weird chill"_

– Mark Lanegan

* * *

><p>It was hard to know where to begin again. The tide had turned, and the rip current had pulled him out to sea. Nature laughed at his imminent doom, and it echoed hauntingly off the waves that threatened to steal his life, yet…<p>

And maybe that was the reason itself. Even in taking responsibility for his bad deeds, his reckless existence, accepting that he'd placed himself here where he was to die and charging in headfirst, maybe part of him had to get in that final "fuck you" to the idea that any of this was inevitable or meant to be. That had to be the reason, he guessed.

It was Spike's first night back in his old bed, and even though it still felt like lying on a slab of concrete, he was in love with it. Anything was better than that hospital bed.

He thought about Mad Pierrot. Staring down the barrel of that gun, about to piss his pants, he knew he did not want to die. He fought and he ran. How much of that had been his choice, he wasn't sure. The human body did whatever it needed to do to survive.

Now he was tired, he was in pain, his heart ached with loss, but fuck if he wasn't free.

It had been over two months. Despite his internal scoffs at the notion in the past, it turned out this goddamn bucket of bolts really was his home. He felt the both the relaxing familiarity and indefinable malaise deep in his bones.

The bed was great, but he couldn't sleep.

He sat up, and it hurt. He wondered if it would always hurt. He was older now, and wounds like these were hard to recover from. He didn't want to think about it too much so he didn't. But he felt the hurt all over, in every part of him.

He sat for awhile and stared at the floor.

He heard the whisper of footsteps go past his door. It seemed he wasn't the only one having trouble sleeping. He heard her coming and going, gliding barefoot along the metal floors all night long.

He laid back down and felt bored and tired.

He'd never been too good at this stuff.

After she had slipped through his grasp on Calypso, Spike, unbeknownst to himself, had accepted that Julia really was gone and that he was never going to see her again. When he saw her standing there in the graveyard that day he felt anxiety, not joy or excitement. It felt more like his sign that the chickens had finally come home to roost, and he knew everything in his life now would go to pieces.

He'd been afraid then. Afraid for Julia, for Jet, for Faye. It was all going to go to pieces.

Seeing her die, lying there in his arms, it felt like theatre. Julia was already dead, and he had already mourned her.

After awhile he heard sobbing through the wall. He rolled onto his side and hugged his pillow.

Here he was trying to figure out how to properly mourn one woman and this girl was mourning every person she'd ever known.

Spike had yet to actually see Faye since he left the Bebop two months ago. She had never come to the hospital, and she had been out when Jet brought him home today.

He didn't mind.

If it had been this long by her doing, he knew when he did see her it probably wouldn't be pleasant. Spike didn't really believe in awkward encounters—he usually just barreled through them, but Faye had a way of letting you know just how she felt, even if she had to scream it.

Jet was pissed at him, too.

Jet understood things that Faye didn't, understood a man's duty, and even though he was pissed, Spike knew he had no plans of mentioning it. But Spike knew Jet had done something, used some part of his arsenal to get him out of trouble with the ISSP—temporarily, anyway. Whatever it was must have been serious, because it wasn't fitting in with Jet's code.

Swell.

He hated hearing this sobbing. It was becoming unbearable. He couldn't seem to tune it out, and he felt something inside his chest constrict at the sound. It made him feel like a jackass for all the times he'd treated her callously, like she didn't have real feelings, because now he had undeniable proof that it wasn't true.

Well, he'd known before now, but it always seemed more convenient to ignore it than acknowledge it. But there was no ignoring this.

There was no ignoring any of this anymore.

He felt a warm tear slide over the bridge of his nose. He didn't know who exactly it was for…Jet, Faye, Julia…hell, it could have even been for the kid and dog. He'd never been too good at this stuff.


	2. Bad

**Bad: Chapter 1**

_"I'm wide awake_  
><em>I'm wide awake<em>  
><em>I'm not sleeping"<em>

– U2

* * *

><p>They were as broke as they had ever been. More, maybe.<p>

Jet brought him his meals in bed, half of which were a cup of microwavable noodles and a can of orange soda. In theory, orange soda sounded great, but really it was terrible stuff. Sickeningly sweet. Spike had no idea how he was going to recover on this diet.

Jet said they would leave Mars soon and go head up some bigger leads. Faye had bagged a couple of hacker nerds who were living in their parent's basement and brought in 10 million woolongs, but most of it had been spent on fixing the Bebop and himself.

"You're joking."

"Yeah, makes me wonder just how hard she'd been trying in the past."

"Jesus." Spike couldn't remember the last time he'd caught such a big bounty.

"Don't be expecting any filet mignon. It's already gone."

Spike made a face like he was about to gripe.

"The whole engine had to be replaced. Between that and your hospital bills, we're cleaned out. Plus, all the heat hanging around here, the bounties have made for the atmosphere. Faye is chasing down every lead she gets."

That shut him up.

"We'll leave for Venus in two days. Try not to smoke your cigarettes too fast."

Spike made another face. Jet was still pissed.

There was something strange about the idea of Jet and Faye having what appeared to be a functional partnership of sorts while he was the odd man out. Whatever paradigm shift his leaving had started, well, it was still shifting. He didn't want to think about it.

He still had not seen hide nor hair of the broad, but he heard her at night.

He wondered if he couldn't hear her, would he have noticed that she wasn't around? She didn't really factor into his life at all. He didn't think about her too much when she wasn't in his face. But whenever she blew out without telling anyone, he was aware of her absence, usually before anyone else. Maybe it was because she was so goddamn loud.

He stood up and tried to stretch, but couldn't stay up for very long. He wanted to go outside badly, to see the sun or the stars, something beyond these metal walls.

Unfortunately, walking was out of the question. His leg had been badly injured. He wasn't quite sure how it happened. If anything, he'd felt assured some vital organ had been split apart by that last swing. His abdomen clenched at the thought, and he began to cough.

He lowered himself back to to his inviting bed. His eyes drifted down the dim bulkhead, sighing. He was completely alone. Maybe it was selfish, but he wanted to go far away from Jet and Faye and everyone that knew him.

When he and Jet had come back yesterday, his arm slung over Jet's shoulder as they meandered through the corridors, Spike found his room to be much tidier than he'd left it. The whole ship looked very clean, actually. He wondered who had cleaned it. Probably Jet. He couldn't help but smile a little, thinking of Jet cooking and cleaning, wearing that ridiculous diner-cook's apron, and Faye bringing home the bacon.

He stared at his cooling cup of Kimchi-flavored noodles. Everything was so quiet. He listened, hearing the bubbles fizzing in his open can of soda.

He wanted something good to eat. Some buttery lobster, some white chocolate raspberry cheesecake, loaded mashed potatoes with sour cream and chives, piping hot cinnamon apples, and chocolate mousse served to him by a hot redhead with double Ds in 4 inch heels.

A wave of fatigue began to swell, pulling him down into the comfort of his pillows. He curled up under the covers, tried to make himself warm, and something occurred to him then...he felt clean for the first time in forever.

* * *

><p>Maybe it was because he was in bed 23 hours a day, but Spike had developed a case of insomnia.<p>

This was an obvious source of annoyance because it meant he was forced to be conscious for endless hours of boredom and thinking, both of which he had little tolerance for. The lack of sleep had slowed the healing process to a crawl, and, if possible, he felt worse now than he had in the hospital.

Spike decided that he'd almost rather be bored than be forced to think. It's not that he disliked thinking—he was a fairly sharp guy, after all. It's just that he preferred to operate on his instincts and not sweat stuff. He hated second guessing himself, and if that made him an arrogant prick, well, he couldn't say different.

He thought about Julia the most. He felt guilty that he wasn't totally crippled by her death. The thought that she was really gone seemed to slip into his mind every few minutes, even when he was feeling alright, and it would floor him for a moment. But despite himself and his quickly departing certainty that his place in life was with her, it was obvious to Spike that he would make it. She had been gone from his life for so long, somewhere along the way he had stopped looking for her everywhere he went, stopped missing her every time he was alone.

He thought about Vicious, about how everything about him seemed wrong. and how somewhere inside himself there was real badness, some truly inexcusable depravity, just like what was inside of Vicious. It was almost embarrassing in a way, to know he'd allowed himself to become so indoctrinated by the ways of the syndicate with all their bullshit traditions and pageantry.

He tried where he could to think about what good things he had, despite how few there seemed to be. His _comrades_. They'd been on a good streak for awhile. Catching bounties, getting along as well as people who could barely stand each other could get along. They had a good run. But it was over now. Things couldn't be the same, it seemed.

Something between him and Jet was different. Edward…God only knew where in the universe that kid was. And Faye, she was a woman, and whatever axe she had to grind, he was sure he'd hear about it before too long.

He hadn't slept for more than 4 hours a night in two weeks. They'd landed on Ganymede this morning, and he was going to get some fresh air or die trying.

He pushed himself onto his feet, ambling toward the door. He only left his room once a day to go to the bathroom, and usually Jet was hanging in the periphery to spot him. His door whooshed open and he edged out, bracing himself against the bulkhead. He was already beginning to think this was a terrible lapse in judgment.

He made slow progress, one arm gripping his freshly-scarred abdomen, the other sliding along the wall, holding him steady as he dragged his bare feet across the sticky cold metal floor. He began approaching the common area. He squinted, hearing the low bass of voices on the television. It had to be Faye. If his supposition about her movements around the ship at night were correct, he was not the only one who had been suffering from a sleep disturbance.

He stopped, considering the scenario. He could turn back now as his body was begging him to do and in effect become a participant in the awkward stalemate she had initiated, or continue onward and ignore whatever he didn't care to acknowledge about his body or Faye Valentine.

He smiled to himself.

The big yellow couch looked white in the phosphorescent glow of the television. He didn't see her immediately, and became annoyed at himself realizing that his first reaction was one of relief. But as the distance closed and he stood in the opening of the hallway, he saw she was dozing away on the sofa. She looked extra tiny, her legs pulled in, her head curled down, spine arched, body turned inward toward the back of the couch.

…_just like that!_

Her voice came back to him, and he felt thrown. He'd avoided thinking about their last encounter as much as he could. His thoughts about it were murky and confused and full of things he was not good with. He'd decided to drop it into a "hysteria by way of life-or-death situation" slot. It could stay there forever as far as he was concerned.

He began attempting to descend the little set of steps into the common room. With no rail to speak of, attempting was the best he could do. He shuffled one foot down, holding his position painfully as he dragged the other down to meet it. It was an arduous task requiring all of his concentration.

He eyed Faye. She appeared undisturbed.

After a handful of near-death stumbles, he was amazed to find he was standing with both feet on the common room floor. His energy was now totally exhausted and the idea of fresh air out on the deck seemed like a distant dream. He practically fell into the little yellow chair across from the couch. His breaths were ragged and he couldn't seem to get enough air into his lungs. He watched Faye across the table, waiting for her to wake at any moment.

After a few minutes of attempting to regain his composure, Spike's eyes moved toward the television. Some motorcycle movie. His eyes lost focus and shifted around on their own accord, refocusing on a tiny piece of heaven. Faye's cigarettes.

He used his foot to slide them across the coffee table, no longer caring about waking her. He extracted a single Chesterfield from the pack, packing it against the back of his hand. The flint sparked loudly, metallically, here in the dark belly of this dead ship, swaying to and fro in a dark night sea. He watched Faye, the orange light of the flame warming her sleeping figure for a long moment before leaving her cold again as his thumb slipped from the lighter's fork.

He closed his eyes. The first drag was amazing, but his joy was short-lived.

"Those are _mine_."

He inhaled so deeply on the cigarette in his lips that he began to hack and sputter. He hated to show when he was startled, but he was far beyond any semblance of composure at this point. She rolled over to face him, but made no move to help him, no show of concern.

The fit finally began to pass, and his words came out between coughs.

"I suppose I deserved that."

"You'll live."

He tilted his head toward the stairs. "With no help from you."

She smiled slyly. "That was fucking golden."

He took another drag and glared at her over the top of the television. She propped her head up on her knuckle and looked back at him, giving nothing away.

"Just what were you trying to achieve with this little adventure?"

He rolled his eyes, aware of the whimsy of his own desire. "I wanted to go outside."

She snorted. "Dressed like that? If the trip hadn't killed you, you would have frozen to death. Not that you could be expected to think of such things."

The axe grinding had started.

"Save it, Faye," he said. He was irritated and tired, and his patience was thin.

She dropped her arm and quickly looked down. He saw her jaw squaring.

Now he'd done it. He braced himself for some sort of outburst, expecting a barrage of insults and accusations to be hurled his way. Instead he watched her stand, collect her cigarettes, and head to the door.

"You really look like shit, you know."

Huh.

Maybe he had over-thought the situation. Worse, maybe he was under thinking it. He sat and finished his cigarette and mulled it over a bit. He decided simply to be satisfied that he still had all of his parts and leave it at that.

He breathed in deep, happy to be out of that cursed room, and he realized suddenly that he had the couch all to himself.


	3. This Must Be The Place

**Bad: Chapter 2**

_"Home is where I want to be_  
><em>Pick me up and turn me round<em>  
><em>I feel numb, born with a weak heart<br>_Guess I must be having fun_  
><em>The less we say about it the better<em><br>_Make it up as we go along___"_

– Talking Heads

* * *

><p>Spike wondered what his life would have been like if he'd never met Julia. He supposed he would probably be dead in one way or another. Either he'd be really dead, like worm food dead, or he'd be completely dead inside where no one could reach him.<p>

It was her love that had made it possible for him to really be able to stand himself. Maybe it was because no one had ever loved him before. He had no parents or siblings, and while he was always able to make friends, she _loved_ him.

She had never said it once. She couldn't say it because it was too dangerous, too truthful. But he knew.

However, that fact alone saddened him deeply, and reminded him of all the things that they had never gotten to do. They'd never gotten to celebrate a birthday or Christmas together. He'd never been able to watch her do her makeup or paint her toenails or pluck her eyebrows. They'd never been able to get in a petty argument about what to have for dinner. Hell, they'd never had a single fight—time really didn't allow it. Every moment was stolen and thus accompanied with a complete lack of assurance as to its next occurrence.

Sometimes he heard _the thought_, the one that said..._"maybe you didn't know her at all." _It hurt to think it, and he didn't really believe it, but it popped up here and there in his seemingly endless ruminations on the subject. He'd felt her in every part of him, and that he knew was true. Everything else, well, it didn't matter much now. She was gone.

Spike laid in bed and smoked and thought. He'd accepted that he didn't have much of a choice at this point. His insomnia persisted, and he had to admit, he was getting quite addicted to all this introspection. Not that anyone needed to know this.

He could get up and around, he supposed. He'd proven to himself he'd been able to. But it didn't seem worth it. Not when the effort he'd put into getting back to his room had caused him to vomit (which Jet had to clean), and his shipmates were barely tolerating his existence (the vomit hadn't helped).

Being that he was a bonafide asshole, part of him wanted to tell them to get bent. He was a grown-ass man and his choices were his. But since he wasn't a total idiot, he knew they were only mad because they cared and because they hurt and because they were all three emotionally retarded and had no better way of showing it. And so he was mad too, because, God help him, he did care.

It had been hard to acknowledge it at first. To his mind, he had just been passing through, whiling away the hours until he met up with Jules again. Then he could be happy. That was where happiness would begin. Any happiness in between, any care he had about anyone or anything else seemed to discolor his fantasy. It would work on him, and he would lose his way.

He hadn't known until he saw her again just how much he'd been worked on. If he were a lesser man he could be mad at them for making him care, for making it so he could feel like himself again, for making him feel like he couldn't run away anymore. For making it so that he chose to stay and fight, and that fight had caused her to be dead. If he were a lesser man.

He hated this maudlin bullshit. He _had_ to get the fuck outside or he was going to go crazy.

This time he remembered his jacket.

_I'll show her._

But again, as he shuffled down the hallway, he heard voices and saw light from the TV.

"You just don't know when to give up, do you?"

Her voice echoed metallically down the corridor. He reached the opening and leaned against it to catch his breath.

"Seems like you'd know that by now. I guess we're both slow learners."

She didn't turn to face him, but instead stared blankly forward, an arm folded across her stomach, the other elbow resting on the back of her hand, cigarette smoke drifting from her fingertips. He noticed the ash was about the entire length of the cigarette.

"You gonna smoke that, or do you want me to?"

Her head jerked to look at the hand holding her cigarette. She moved her eyes past her cigarette and fixed them on him. She made a show of flicking the cigarette high into the air where it bounced off the wall, tiny embers scattering like fireworks.

"Well, I'll take that as my cue." He began the arduous process of edging his way down the stairs.

"Hey, seriously," she stood, "you've gotta cut this shit out, Spike."

He continued his teetering descent. "What do you care? Let me be. I want out of this tin can."

She came to stand in front of him at the foot of the stairs. "Well haven't we become quite the drama queen? Last time I checked, I'm the one that paid your goddamn hospital bill."

"Yeah, well, I didn't ask you too. I don't much fancy the idea of letting you have that to hold over my head for the rest of my life."

"You're not gonna have a life if you keep pulling these fucking stunts."

He was on the last step now, and she stood her ground. It was the first time he'd looked her in the eye since he'd been back. Her face was pure anger, but her eyes gave her away.

"Look, Mom, I'm twice your size. Even in this shape, you know you can't stop me. So if I were you, I'd get the hell out of my way."

She scowled with unadulterated disdain, and after a long moment, stepped aside.

"I hope you pull something inside and bleed out."

He limped forward. "I sure missed you, Faye."

He began moving toward the hallway that would take him out onto the flight deck, dragging one of his legs behind him. Brilliant as he was, he called out over his shoulder.

"So are you just going to stand there? I mean, I am injured after all." He imagined the look on her face. It made him happy inside.

He heard her shuffle around behind him and curse to herself as he carried on. Moments later she came up beside him, pulling a sweatshirt over her head.

"You're unbelievable, you know."

He looked at her.

"I know."

It sounded apologetic even to his own ears. Her expression didn't change. Despite his past and somewhat present cynicism about almost everything regarding Faye Valentine, in that moment he wanted her to accept it, as lame as an apology as it was. But he figured he wouldn't really know for awhile whether she did or didn't. Faye was a woman in every sense of the word.

She turned away, crossed her arms, and they continued on side by side.

* * *

><p>Spike was somewhat concerned that he'd built up this "outside" thing to be more than it really was. So, yeah, it was cold, it was wet, but it was <em>not<em> a disappointment. He closed his eyes and let the smell and the sound wash over him.

Faye stood beside him inside the hangar door and lit two cigarettes. She passed him one for which he nodded his thanks.

"You're a strange bird, Spike."

"Guess that's better than being an odd duck."

"You just proved my point."

"Well, I have plenty of time to think of witty comebacks these days."

"What the hell do you do in there all day?"

"I'm knitting booties for your and Jet's future offspring."

"Someone's jealous I see. Don't worry, Spike. You'll always be the favorite. Jet even went to that weird old Indian to try to find you."

"I believe the term is 'Native American'."

"He said your star was going to fall. Said he had dreamed it."

Something about those words felt strange, like a rock had just been tied to his insides and it was dragging him down, pulling him apart.

"Maybe that means I'm dead."

"Yeah, and hell is a diet of ramen and cheap novelty soda."

Her words...he felt like he'd been cursed. This was his life, it was all his own creation, and he was like poison to everyone around him.

"I'm going to bed." Again she flicked her cigarette, and this time it skipped across the damp flight deck, extinguished by the rain.

He reached out and put his hand on her shoulder.

"Why can't you sleep?"

Her pale face glowed brightly in the moonlight. She looked like she could barely comprehend the question, let alone give him any answer. He could tell that he was the last person on earth she ever wanted to tell, but he held on. She spoke to her feet.

"I just can't stop thinking lately. All I think about is who I used to be and I can't sleep."

All at once she looked like a total stranger to him, but he felt closer to her than he ever had before.

"I get that."

She didn't look at him. "C'mon. You'll never make it back on your own, and I don't want to hear Jet bitching about your vomit."

He braced himself, his hand on her shoulder as she walked ahead of him back to the common room. She felt tiny in his grasp. He decided the couch was far enough so she left him there and headed down the darkened hallway to her room.

He figured she had accepted his apology, but he'd never know for sure.


	4. It's All Over Now, Baby Blue

**Bad: Chapter 3**

_"__Leave your stepping stones behind, something calls for you_  
><em>Forget the dead you've left, they will not follow you<em>  
><em><em><em>The vagabond who's rapping at your door<em>_  
><em><em>Is standing in the clothes that you once wore<em>_  
><em><em>Strike another match, go start anew<em>_  
><em><em>And it's all over now, Baby Blue"<em>_  
><em>

- Bob Dylan

* * *

><p>"I'm glad to see all of your abdominal injuries have healed nicely. How's your mobility?"<p>

"It sucks. I feel nauseous whenever I try to walk."

"It'll be like that for awhile. You've suffered major trauma."

"That's not new."

Spike sat shirtless and sullen on the examination table in the Doc's tiny office. Being poked and prodded in any form never went smoothly for Spike. It was impossible for him to cooperate, no matter how hard he tried to be good. He started getting irritable and surly and that always made whoever was doing the prodding prod harder.

The Doc placed a cold stethoscope to his chest. He felt his temper flare.

"You're right about that. Breathe in deep. But we all get old, and you're no exception. Exhale."

The Doc took off his stethoscope. "You treat your body like shit. I suppose it's pointless for me to tell you that you should probably think about quitting smoking."

"I could think of more fruitful endeavors."

"I'm a little concerned about that leg. It's possible you've experienced some nerve damage. If it's still giving you trouble in a few weeks, we'll have to take a closer look at it. I'll give you an anti-emetic for the nausea."

"News like that and you're asking me to quit smoking? Can you believe this guy?"

Doc turned to Jet, "Are you going to be able to continue accommodating him?"

"Yeah, me and my partner…our other partner, I mean…she helps me out."

Spike suddenly went from being pettily annoyed to downright inflamed.

"Ah, that girl with the dark hair? I'd like it if she was taking care of me too," the Doc said, winking, and scribbling away on his charts.

Jet seemed to have realized his earlier blunder and remained pointedly silent. This bristled Spike more.

"Yeah, well she's a real pain the ass sometimes," Spike said looking Jet's direction. "She has a way of standing on your dick." He was quite satisfied with himself now.

Jet said nothing and the Doc scribbled away. "You can put your clothes back on."

"Finally, " Spike said, jerking his shirt over his shoulders.

* * *

><p>Spike was trying not to be pissed, trying to tell himself he was overreacting, but he was failing miserably. He stalked back to his ship, nausea be damned.<p>

Partners! When had Faye ever taken less than half of anything? Partners respected each other, had an understanding. Spike and Jet had the boys club and Faye was always the outsider.

Jet trailed behind him in some attempt to put distance between them. He looked old and tired in a way Spike had never really noticed before. It seemed he had grown 10 years older overnight. His beard was peppered with strands of gray, and his skin was…looser somehow, it hung on him differently than before.

Spike leaned against his ship, still steaming. The Swordfish had been fixed up quite well. He'd been a little surprised at how good she looked. He hadn't thought much about it until now.

He watched Jet ambling toward him as he took deep breaths and tried to will away the nausea. Then he vomited.

* * *

><p>Spike didn't try to be too cool for school—he just was. He liked to fight and smoke and drink and make caustic remarks and do whatever the fuck he wanted.<p>

But being too cool was starting to catch up with him in a bad way. The fighting, smoking, and drinking were starting to age him. It had never really occurred to him that he wouldn't live forever, especially considering his recent brush with oblivion (which, from an outside perspective, looked more like a really complicated suicide attempt). But his body was starting to creak and crack and hurt in funny places when it was cold outside. This was decidedly not cool.

The other stuff was coming back to bite him too.

He didn't want to think about it. He couldn't change who he was anyway. It was easier not to try.

He just wanted to sleep. Everything would be better. He was fucking miserable, and he knew if he could sleep he would feel like himself again. He would wake up and he would find that all of this was really nothing, that it was less than trivial, that his life was just as it always had been. Jet wouldn't be turning into an old man before his very eyes. Faye would go back to being a shrill wench he could conveniently ignore. And he'd go back to not worrying or thinking at all.

Except now she was really dead, and nothing could bring her back.

* * *

><p>Spike thought maybe the sofa would solve the sleep problem. He always seemed to sleep much better there than in his own bed. But it didn't help. He just ended up watching re-runs of Big Shot.<p>

He had no idea why anyone would want to watch a show with info on old bounties. Maybe it was a nostalgia thing. All of the bounties had their faces blurred and their last names bleeped out. Sometimes, he would see one that they'd gone after and he would be right there again. That time Edward had found the guy's address but would only give it to him if he solved a word puzzle she'd devised. Or when Jet got so excited after they finally caught one because he hadn't been grocery shopping in a month that he bought them all a bunch of old Halloween candy that was on clearance.

Actually, he realized it was perfect entertainment for ex-bounty hunters, which is what he supposed he was now.

"Re-living your glory days?"

"I'd have to have some to re-live them."

Faye stood in the doorway in her oversized sweatshirt and tiny sleep shorts. The images from the TV danced across her pale legs and he noticed they were starting to look very thin.

"What's that you got there?"

"Lime soda."

"Ugh."

"Nah, it actually kinda tastes like 7Up."

"What?"

"Nevermind. I'm thinking I'll try mixing it with vodka."

"I want to make sure I'm far away when that happens."

She descended the steps, sat in the chair, crossed her legs, and looked thoughtfully at the TV.

"This shit?"

"There's nothing else on."

She produced a pack of cigarettes. They sat in silence, her smoking, sipping her soda, and Spike staring into the TV without really seeing any of it. His mind was nothing but white noise, and he wanted to disappear into it.

"Hah, I remember this guy."

Spike re-focused. "I remember was when we were doing recon on this guy I got the most amazing hotdog from some guy who was just cooking them out in one of those street carts. I don't remember much else."

"You probably forgot on purpose because you fucked the whole thing up."

"I never do that."

They were silent again.

"So, are you pissed off you're not dead?"

"I don't know. I guess not. Are you?"

"Sometimes."

He was annoyed, but he laughed anyway. She smiled at him a little, a glimmer of mischief showing in her eyes.

Maybe Jet liked her or something. He understood it, he guessed, but it was still irritating.

"You think you'll start bounty hunting again soon?"

"I'm still not a hundred percent yet. Maybe I won't anyway. I don't know."

She scoffed, "What else ya gonna do?"

He shrugged.

"If you don't sleep, how do have it in you to do it?"

"I get some sleep, just not much. I guess it's enough. Did you get something from the doctor for it?"

"I forgot to tell him. I guess I've just gotten used to it."

"Damn. I was hoping maybe he gave you something."

"Why, so you could swipe some?"

"Duh."

"Why don't you just go yourself?"

"I've got this thing with doctors and hospitals."

"Right."

"This is boring. I'm going back to bed."

"Sweet dreams."

"Something."

She padded off back down the hall, her tiny feet swishing on the metal floor.

He guessed he got it, but maybe not.


	5. Nutshell

**Bad: Chapter 4**

_"__We chase misprinted lies_  
><em>We face the path of time <em>  
><em><em><em><em>And yet I fight <em>__  
><em><em><em><em><em><em>And yet I fight<em>_____  
><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em>This battle all alone<em><br>______________________No one to cry to ________________________________  
><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em><em> No place to call home"<em>___________  
><em>

- Alice in Chains

* * *

><p>Weeks passed that were much the same. No sleep, lying awake all night, staring into the TV.<p>

This was grief, he realized. Perhaps it should have been obvious, but it wasn't. It was easy to attribute his irritation to his tense relationships with Jet and Faye, to blame the lack of sleep and inability to focus on his poor physical state.

But it was all about her. He knew it because slowly his thoughts about her were changing. Before, he would think of her and the jarring realization that he was never going see her ever again would hit him and it would feel new every single time, twenty times a day. But that feeling was starting to dull. It was beginning to come familiar and each realization of the truth was more easily processed than the last.

They were docked on Mars. He got up and dressed himself, early—before anyone else was up, and flew to the city.

He went and saw the Doc again. He was pissed off that Spike woke him up so early, but he checked him out anyway. He told him that his leg hadn't sustained any nerve damage, but that he was looking forward to months of physical therapy. He gave him some instructions, told him that Jet would have to help him.

It was still early when he left. He wandered into a weathered corner store near the waterfront and bought some cigarettes, cereal, milk, and a bouquet of flowers with his last few dollars.

He sat on a concrete bench. The water looked metallic in the gray morning. It swayed, no waves forming or breaking. He took out the flowers, removed them from their paper, and began tossing them one-by-one into the water.

He saved a red rose for last.

* * *

><p>When he came in Jet was in the kitchen. He took the folded papers the doctor had given him out of his pocket and handed them to Jet.<p>

"What's this?"

"Physical therapy stuff. I'm losing my goddamn mind sitting around here all day."

Spike sat down at the table and unbagged his milk and cereal. Jet handed him a bowl and spoon out of the drying rack.

"Thanks."

He poured a bowl. Jet made himself a cup of coffee and sat down, looking over the papers Spike had given him.

"You want some?"

"That's kiddie stuff."

Faye entered toweling her hair.

"Hey, no one told me there was cereal."

She sat down at the little table that was quickly becoming overcrowded and poured herself a bowl.

"I could eat cereal for every meal," she said, mouth full.

Jet's expression read something like, _'Told ya so.'_

"What's the next bounty?"

"You think you're game?"

"Guess we'll find out."

The three of them sat at the table, finishing up their breakfasts, and everything was alright.

* * *

><p>"If your plan wasn't stupid I wouldn't be calling it stupid."<p>

"Maybe it's not stupid. Maybe you just don't understand it."

"Oh, so I guess that means _I'm_ stupid."

Spike supposed it was foolish to expect that the cereal would have gained him any good will. It had seemed to do the trick for a minute or two. He screwed up his face, contemplating this unfortunate turn.

"What's that look for?"

"Nothing. Jesus. I can't even make a face without you jumping down my throat."

"Oh, ex_cuse_ me. Maybe if everything you did wasn't so condescending I wouldn't be so sensitive."

"You have a vagina, Faye. Irrationality is in your nature."

"Ho-ho! We've got a fucking comedian here."

"ENOUGH!"

Spike and Faye both sheepishly shrank away from their petty altercation.

"He started it."

A look of disbelief overtook Jet's face.

"Fucking Christ. You two are relentless. It's a wonder I have a hair left on my head. Maybe I should take this one alone."

"No way! This is my guy. I got the intel."

"I'll give you your fair share, but we need to move on this one or you _will_ be eating that cereal for every meal."

"Why can't we do it together? It will be easier that way."

Jet cast a look in Spike's direction. He had learned his lesson the other day at the doctor's office. "Someone needs to stay with Spike."

"Oh, what the fuck! I'm not a fucking cripple!"

"Yeah, and since when did I become Florence fucking Nightingale?"

"Who the hell is that?"

"What are you bitching about? You'll get what was coming to you anyway and you don't have to do any work." Jet's tone became quieter. "Please, Faye, do me a favor."

Her face was hard, but she agreed. "Fine, but if this one gets away, we are totally screwed. It's the best lead I've gotten in weeks. You really shouldn't do this alone."

Spike was about to complain again about being treated like an invalid until saw her face soften a bit with something. Perhaps concern? A ghost of something had appeared in the room and then dissipated as quickly as it had come.

He thought maybe he was nuts before when he considered that Jet might actually be into Faye, but here it was again, and it didn't seem to be one-sided.

Faye cast a look at Spike. "Well, I hope you're happy."

"I'm stuck with you now. How could I be?"

Jet rubbed his head. "My god…does it ever end?"

* * *

><p>"This is taking forever. Jet should be back by now. Maybe we should go look for him."<p>

"He's only been gone a few hours. Chill out."

"God, I hate it when people say that. It's so fucking annoying."

"What about me doesn't annoy you, Faye?"

She tossed out another card on the table.

"I'm trying to think of something, but I'm drawing a blank. Give me two."

Spike flicked his wrist and two cards appeared before her.

"Since when do you worry so much about Jet anyway?"

"You're the fair-haired kid, Spike."

"What's that mean?"

"It means get over yourself. Jet and I are allowed to be friends, too. You don't have to worry about me stepping on your toes."

"I was just asking a question. You don't have to make it into something it's not."

"Show me your hand."

Spike processed the sentence and after a moment splayed his cards on the table.

"Kings full of 2s."

Faye threw her cards down. "Oh, go to hell."

"Whatcha got?"

"Pair of Jacks. I could have beat you, but I decided to play fair."

"You can't cheat with me. I'll catch you."

"I know. That's why I didn't."

Spike watched as Faye began gathering the deck of cards together, leaning forward and sliding them across the table toward her.

"So, I take it you guys are running around or something?"

Faye's faced turned up to face him, and the anger was immediate.

"Who are you? You've been acting all weird lately. Like a totally different person."

"Jeez, it was just a question."

"Well, it's weird. Quit it. I think you've been sitting around in that dank room too much. It's making your brain soft."

They were silent for a moment while Faye idling shuffled the cards with no apparent intention of dealing another hand.

She kept her eyes on her hands. "What would it matter to you anyway?"

"It wouldn't," Spike said assuredly.

She slammed the deck of cards on the table. "Then quit fucking asking."

With that, she stormed out. Spike noticed a card had slipped off the top of the deck. He picked it up and stared blankly into it.

He hadn't heard it, but Jet had come in behind him.

"Yo, Spike. Whatcha got there?"

"Three of spades."

"Huh?"

"Forget it."

"I brought home bacon. Real bacon. The kind you eat."

"Hah, aces."


	6. A Little Soul

**Bad: Chapter 5**

_I had one, two, three, four shots of happiness._  
><em>I look like a big man<em>  
><em>But I've only got a little soul.<em>

- Pulp

* * *

><p>Miles Houten, despite being a stalwart public servant with a true distaste for crime, was overjoyed as he stared down the destroyed skyscraper in downtown Tharsis.<p>

For over a decade now he had been on a crusade to put an end to organized crime in his city, a difficult battle made even more difficult by the corrupt bureaucrats who were on the syndicate payrolls. He'd seen it first when he started out as a prosecutor of those committing minor offenses—theft, drug possession—things of the like. He saw the favorable treatment syndicate thugs received from judges and even bailiffs; saw the intimidated witnesses, the hanged juries, the dismissed charges and reduced sentences. His wise predecessors had warned him from the outset, but the extent of it was far beyond anything he could have hoped to imagine. At a point it was almost enough to make him hang up his hat and start a private practice. Obviously, it was the choice profession in this city. He'd never even have to advertise; all he'd have to do was walk down to any corner and he could pick up five clients in one trip.

Only one thing had stopped him. Her name was Candy Iris Blackwell-Houten—his mother. It was as though when he was growing inside of her belly she had given him far more than just nutrients and sustenance. She'd fed him her values and beliefs, her profound empathy for others that could not be divided from logic—it _was_ her logic. He'd felt these things his whole life—how else would they have gotten there unless she'd put them inside of him before his birth?

Regardless of how it came to pass, District Attorney Andrew Miles Houten had a moral compass that was so unmovable nearly everyone was fairly irritated by it, including himself. Still now, years after his mother's passing, her legacy was left to flower inside of her only son—whether he liked it or not.

Therefore, he could not help but be excited seeing the headquarters of the Red Dragon syndicate stand smoking in the afternoon sun—still smoldering from the evening before. It was more than just vindication, a reward for the years he put up with the unending avalanche of bullshit. No, this was something more. This was an opportunity. One he was to make great use of.

* * *

><p>"Ow! Fucking ow! Fuck!"<p>

Jet suddenly had a flash, a pang, a feeling that he'd really screwed up his life. This was not what he'd wanted for himself. He'd wanted a home, a life with a good woman, wanted a son and maybe a daughter too. A little girl on whom he would bestow a funny nickname like 'peanut butter pie', something that when she heard it, she would know she was truly loved—because only someone who really loved her would find it inside themselves to be so embarrassingly saccharine.

Instead, he had this ship and two gigantic babies.

He looked down at Spike who was lying prone on the padded workout mat, and he scorned the parents who had abandoned him and left him to grow up with such horrible manners.

He leaned back and took his weight off Spike's bent knee. He'd been helping Spike with his physical therapy for two weeks now and he had been a real ungrateful son-of-a-bitch. He was pissy about even being made to do it in the first place, and was cranky and difficult throughout each session.

"Alright. I'm done for today."

"Thank fucking God."

"You know _what_—"

He bit his tongue. Like always.

"What?"

Jet busied himself with picking up the miscellaneous detritus strewn about the bridge. "Get the dishes out of your room. We don't have enough plates."

"Well, you could always let Faye starve."

"Without Faye we'd both be starving."

"God, not this bit again."

"Get the goddamn dishes."

"I could take on a bounty right now. You guys need to stop cutting me out."

"I'm not re-doing all of this bullshit with you because you decide to go out there and show your ass."

"Fuck it. I'll go out on my own then."

Jet was beyond fed up. "Fine! Just get the motherfucking dishes!"

With that, he stormed off of the bridge, charged through the common area, cutting a resolute path through the corridors, and burst out of the hangar on the opposite end of the ship, determined to get as far away from Spike and Faye as possible.

Something was terribly wrong with him. To bend over backwards to help these hopeless fucks, certainly this spoke to some mental defect.

Although, it had occurred to him recently that perhaps they weren't hopeless at all. Perhaps he was the one who would be left with nothing meaningful to do if they were not around for him to fret over. It was a source of great anger that he'd allowed looking after them to become the skeleton of his existence. It made him feel like an old man with nothing to show for the forty years he'd spent in this miserable solar system. At least Edward was of an age that warranted his anxiety and concern. Spike was damn near thirty. Granted, he often behaved as though he was about half that old and Faye was certainly not the model of personal responsibility either.

He frowned. Both of them had a very tweaked understanding of the social contract.

Jet lit a cigarette and looked out over the horizon. He could see the distant silhouette of a slowly turning ferris wheel against the purple sky. He'd rode one with Alisa once.

No matter where he was in his life, the past always seemed to be happier than he was now. Maybe he'd used up all of his happiness already. Sure his childhood had been no picnic, but it was never horrible. Just somewhere in the middle. His mother had died when he was twenty-two and his old man was never really a person after that, but before then things were alright. They'd even had enough money to take a little vacation every now and then. Nothing fancy. Just off to a neighboring planet for a few days. They'd loved him okay, even if they weren't so great at showing it.

Jet remembered when he told his old man he was going to enroll at the police academy. His father hadn't favored the idea—it was too violent for someone who'd spent his whole life sanding down chairs and routering the edges of tables. Still, he didn't protest. They'd never protested much about anything his whole life. Not to him and not to each other. It wasn't a bad life.

He met Alisa the week his father passed away. It seemed only fitting, he guessed. He had no other family to speak of. She never protested much either. Not until that day last year in a sunset much like this. But he was okay with that. Time never stands still, after all. He just wished Spike knew that.

* * *

><p>After he'd cooled down a bit, Jet decided to head in and make dinner. Faye was out and about again, but he knew she'd be back in time to eat. She was that breed.<p>

He stopped in the common area to check his mail. The screen cast a calm blue light over the room and he started to feel a bit more peaceful. It was mostly junk as usual, but as he scrolled through the queue, a letter from Bob burned his eyes.

He'd known this day was coming.

_DA is handing down orders to the chief to pick up anyone that's with the Red Dragons and Spiegel has been named. No warrants. Just statements for now. Better bring him in voluntarily before it gets out of hand. They've recovered some surveillance footage from the building on Tharsis._

_Tried my best._

_Bob_

Jet leaned back into the couch and let his head fall slack. Everything would go to pieces now. He sat for a long time, staring into the ceiling until it went away completely and he watched tiny specs of colorful static dance across his eyes.

He wondered if Spike would leave. It was a distinct possibility. Maybe it was for the best. Maybe this had all just been a coda to a long, tired song.

The sound of the Red Tail landing roused him quickly from the sofa. He moved toward the kitchen, hoping to avoid Faye.

For all of her bitchiness and bravado, she was a good girl. Fucked up for sure, but a nice kid underneath it all. He'd really learned that in the weeks when it had just been the two of them. He didn't know the whole story but he knew she'd had a rough go of it, that her background was something far beyond your ordinary blues tale. That everything bad she was, well, it was justified and then some.

Anyway, since then, he didn't like seeing her be upset. She'd had enough disappointment for two lifetimes.

In that way, he'd actually felt bad for Spike. She'd really let him have it. On one hand, he'd sort of deserved it. His self-imposed isolation, his casualness, it was more than a little frustrating because he really made you believe it. But on the other hand, he'd bore the brunt of a storm that had been brewing long before Faye had even stepped foot on the Bebop.

Maybe she knew that now in retrospect. She'd been fairly aloof herself since Spike had been back on board. Not in a punitive way—she just seemed to have bigger things on her mind. She would disappear for days at a time, working the area, picking up bounties all on her own. What time she was aboard she spent mostly in her room. She didn't seem sad per se, just…different. Quieter, more thoughtful.

Jet stood in the doorway of the kitchen wondering how she'd take this new development. He saw that the dish rack was full of newly cleaned dishes. Then he covered his eyes with one hand and willed himself not to cry.


	7. The Greatest

**Bad: Chapter 6**

_"Once I wanted to be the greatest_  
><em>No wind or waterfall could stop me<em>  
><em>And then came the rush of the flood<em>  
><em>The stars at night turned you to dust"<em>

- Cat Power

* * *

><p>Baker Panchorero. She'd chased this guy before, and they'd caught him too. Now he was out on the street again, having skipped bail for the charges they'd picked up him for in the first place. At first, Faye felt like she was getting one over on the system—being able to turn in the same guy twice for basically the same crime with an even bigger price on his head than before. She had all of the advantages—knowledge of his known associates and hangouts, what he looked like and how he operated. Still, the more she thought about it, the less good it felt. For the first time since becoming a bounty hunter, she felt herself wanting to grouse about the inefficiency of the system. Thinking about all the effort they put into finding these fuckers, only to find out that they were just turning them loose with so little supervision—was this the sting of pride she was feeling?<p>

She'd probably been working too much. It did seem like that was all she'd been doing lately.

Faye peered through her binoculars into the window of the building across the street. The setting sun was unbearably hot on her back and the rough rooftop had scraped her elbows and stomach. She was gonna get this prick for sure.

"One-eyed son-of-a-bitch."

She rolled onto her back and lit a cigarette. The sky was going all pink and purple. Sometimes, even Mars' moons looked pink. Maybe it was the reflection of the planet or something. She didn't know. Every now and then she wished that she has paid more attention in science class. It was always her worst subject. It was something of a sore spot with her father. He was a doctor, after all, and he had always hoped she might go into medicine as well.

She rolled back onto her stomach. She couldn't think about her father for too long. Remembering him was the hardest.

"This fucker better show up soon."

"He's already here."

She heard the click of a gun being cocked.

'_Fuck.'_

She heard Baker's gruff voice. "Stand up."

She pushed herself up on her knees and grimaced, realizing that he was probably getting an obscene view of her ass. She straightened up slowly, raising her arms above her head.

"Careful there, cowboy. Bank robbery and bail jumping is one kind of thing. Kidnapping is quite another."

He pressed the cold barrel of his pistol into her bare lower vertebrate.

"Who said anything about taking you captive?" He nudged her forward a little. "Maybe you just…slipped."

"C'mon, Pancho. We both know you're a first-rate scumbag, but you're no murderer." Faye lifted one foot to scratch her ankle.

"Make one more move and we'll test that theory."

Faye sighed. "Well, in that case, I guess I'd be better off just jumping on my own then, huh?"

"Wait, wha—"

She smiled to herself as she stepped up on the ledge and turned around to face him.

He was trembling violently, both hands gripping his gun. "I said 'don't move'!"

She saluted. "Be seeing you, Pancho."

Baker's face was one of total horror, and for a second she felt bad as she stepped backward off the rooftop. He even reached his hand out to grab her. It was kind of sweet.

She tumbled awkwardly into the Redtail's cockpit, and tried to right herself quickly. It had really hurt her ass.

The door whooshed shut and she zoomed up the side of the building, pointing her guns into Baker's still-shocked face. His hands immediately shot into the air, and he began trembling comically. She felt bad again. Well, just a little. She shook her head and smiled.

'_What would Dad think of me now?'_

* * *

><p>Faye pushed open the door of the ISSP precinct, leading a cuffed Baker in by a rope tied to his shiny bracelets much like a lassoed steer.<p>

"Ms. Valentine. I was wondering when we were going to see you."

"Hi, Lester. I've brought you a very special present."

She jerked her rope, pulling Baker forward. The desk clerk smiled excitedly.

"Pancho! Nice to see you again. We've missed you."

"Hi, Lester," he said woefully.

"I think he's just happy he'll be rid of me soon."

"This bitch is crazy."

Lester cackled and buzzed Baker through the gate for processing.

"How's business been, darlin'?"

She leaned on the counter girlishly. "Oh, ya know, about the same. Just a bunch of small fries. Got anything new on the roster? Something like in the 5 mil range?"

"Nothing yet, but I've heard we'll be getting a lot of new additions next week. Apparently, this hotshot new DA is going on the warpath."

"What about?"

"Syndicate crime."

Faye felt something cold in her stomach.

"Any particular reason he's cracking down now?"

"Not that I can say for sure, but all the stuff with the Red Dragons has to be part of it."

She nodded slowly. "You're probably right about that. You can't blow up a building and expect to get away with it, huh?"

* * *

><p>Spike was such an asshole. Nevermind that that was half of his charm. He was still an irredeemable bastard of the highest order.<p>

She felt sick. The fact that she'd just gorged herself on a plateful of barbeque pork ribs played a part in that, sure, but it was mostly due to this ISSP shit. Everything was going to pieces again.

She paid for her meal and picked up her to-go order from the front counter. He so did not deserve beef brisket. But she couldn't help herself. She was fucking hopeless.

Her recent zealousness regarding her work served a few unmistakable purposes.

For one thing, it helped her keep her sanity. Since regaining her memories, she'd been unable to control her mind. Her thoughts were always racing, always rolling over past events, re-examining them through the filter of her new life. It had sent her into an emotional tailspin for a few weeks and it was the primary reason she'd been unable to sleep for what seemed like ages. The only thing that seemed to mitigate this was staying busy. So she worked as often as she could, as much as her sleep-deprived body would allow.

With all of her earnings, she was able to help take care of the boys—something she'd never had any special desire to do before, but that now seemed to be a crucial part of her existence. Jet had needed a lot of help getting the ship in working order again and the bond between them had grown in such a way that she _wanted_ to help him out. She and Spike owed him that much, and Spike could do little do carry his end. And with Spike, well, despite her extreme anger toward him, she wanted to help carry him through this bullshit. She just wanted him to be okay.

The evening was warm and the smell of burning leaves wafted through the night as she clomped down the city streets toward the Redtail. She wiped away a tear that was beginning to form.

'_What a prick.'_

She wanted her sentiments toward him to be the same as those that she held for Jet, but they weren't. How she'd quantify them, she couldn't say, but they affected her in a far deeper way. They were an enormous intrusion, and it fucking pissed her off. Even now, knowing how close he had been to oblivion, she wanted to fall to her knees and cry her heart out.

Her solution was to avoid him as much as possible. That was her plan, and she was sticking to it.


	8. Sad and Beautiful World

**Bad: Chapter 7**

_"Sometimes days go speeding past_  
><em>Sometimes this one seems like the last<em>  
><em>It's a sad and beautiful world"<em>

- Sparklehorse

* * *

><p>Spike wondered vaguely if this migraine was a symptom of a stroke or an aneurysm. He'd had a lot of concussions. Actually, he didn't know if the two things were related. But he had this feeling that the aching blood vessel in his skull was soon to collapse, that any moment he'd get dizzy and pass out and fall right off side of the Bebop, into the water where he would silently and unceremoniously drown.<p>

As such, he continued to sit on the edge of the deck with his feet dangling over the water, waiting to see if his suspicion would be validated.

After he'd finished washing the dishes, he waited in his room for Jet to come back inside so he could slink out and get some fresh air. It seemed to be everyone's favorite spot lately, and being that he was the least mobile of the group, he never seemed to get to it before someone else did.

Unfortunately, he barely got ten minutes of peace before he heard the Redtail approaching. He saw the softly blinking navigation lights float like specters in the dark and then hurriedly zoom in overhead. He made no move to get up which meant Faye was forced to hover and land from above as opposed to being able to cruise in and land the easy way.

She climbed out, cigarette pursed in her lips, and made a hateful face.

"Asshole."

"I was here first."

She turned away scowling, and threw her cigarette on the deck. "You…suck."

He shrugged.

She leaned into her ship to pick up a brown paper sack and re-emerged again, slamming the door shut. "You should put a shirt on. You look emaciated."

"Like you know what that means."

"It means you look like a fucking Holocaust victim."

"A what?"

"Oh, never-fucking-mind. You're hopeless."

She spun on her heel and began to head inside.

"Hey, is that food?"

She called over her shoulder. "Maybe."

"Wait up."

He hoisted himself to his feet and began to follow.

"Who said there was enough for you? You've been hoarding all the goddamn dishes in your room so we've got nothing to eat on. I think we should let you starve."

He scoffed as they moseyed toward the common room. "Huh. Cavalier today, aren't we?"

Faye cast an unimpressed glance his direction. He was walking slightly behind her with his hands tucked in his pockets, cigarette resting laconically in his lips.

"Like you know what that means."

"It means you're being especially bitchy. As in more than every other day."

"I was feeling just fine until about five minutes ago. Funny how that goes."

"You skirts and your mood swings."

"So that's how you rationalize women's behavior toward you."

"Oh, you know how it is. One minute they're acting like they can't stand you and the next they're begging you not to go."

The words had just fallen out of his mouth.

He hadn't even been thinking about Faye when the sentence began, but by the end, there it was—bare and artless and unambiguous. He'd acknowledged it straight to her face. Or, well, to the back of her head.

He couldn't see her expression, and there was no overt indication that she had also made the connection between his words and that night save for her immediate silence. Certainly it couldn't have been lost on her, clever girl as she was, but with she gave nothing away and instead continued to walk ahead of him saying nothing at all.

The moment passed; it was now impossible to ever know for sure.

* * *

><p>The narrow, darkened hallway expanded suddenly into the bright an open common room. Sometimes it was the only place in the whole ship Spike could stand. Much of the ship was dark and cramped, especially for a tall person. He'd spent most of the earnings from his first bounty buying a bed that was actually long enough to accommodate his height.<p>

He deposited himself in the middle of the sofa, rubbing his overtaxed thigh with one hand, smoking with the other. Faye continued onward toward the kitchen. He could smell something cooking and hear the sizzling of a frying pan, although he wasn't sure what it was.

"Well, I wish you would have called. I wouldn't have wasted my goddamn time cooking. I coulda been changing the oil filter."

"Shit. I'm fucking sorry. I won't even bother next time."

Spike blatantly eavesdropped on their conversation, leaning in further to hear better.

"I didn't mean to snap. It's just been a rough night."

Their voices lowered and disappeared behind the ugly crackling of oil in the skillet. They must be talking about him. He forcefully threw his cigarette butt to the ground and watched it bounce back up and land on the yellow chair across from him.

"_God_ damnit."

He scrambled up to brush away the butt, the cherry disintegrating into tons of tiny embers, burning his hand and creating a buckshot pattern of holes in the upholstery. He quickly flipped the cushion over, turned on the TV and sat down, pretending as though nothing had happened.

This was the way things were now. He supposed it was time to get used to it.

Faye materialized in the doorway, arms crossed, gaze darting suspiciously between him and the vacated couch. After a moment, she sighed heavily and Jet appeared at her side. They looked like the weary parents of a juvenile delinquent who just wouldn't shape up.

"Something's happened. It ain't good."

* * *

><p>When had she gotten rid of the hotpants?<p>

During tonight's "state of the union," Spike had found himself searching for some distraction from the events that were unfolding before him. It was during this time that he noticed Faye's routinely exposed legs, often a lighthearted diversion that no one would think less of him for indulging in, were no longer that.

Everything was changing around him and he could barely be made to notice.

He rolled over in bed. So it goes. Brotherhoods will crumble, lovers will die, and shameless broads will suddenly become demure when it is least convenient.

In a span of ten minutes, Jet had laid out the entire path his life was to take, either by choice or by proxy. Should he decide to stay here, he was likely to be completely ensnared by the system he had been dodging since the moment he ran away from the boy's home when he was twelve. By choosing not to stay, he would now and forever be a fugitive, forced even further out into the margins than he'd already placed himself. As long as he was alive there were no other options.

It wasn't the worst pickle he'd ever been in, he supposed.

The only thing left to do now was make a decision.

Three years ago, the choice would have been stupidly obvious to him and everyone who knew him. But even he had changed, it seemed. He'd faced down Vicious to close the door on the past, to put an end to running away. To start running again now…

Maybe he was just getting too old. Soon he would be 28, practically ancient for someone in his line of work.

He pushed himself out of bed, convinced he was never going to sleep again in this lifetime. At least now he could walk.

* * *

><p>The midnight stroll to the common area had grown into both a comforting and melancholy ritual. He enjoyed the eerie quietness, the ethereal cast of the television that left everything beyond it even darker for lacking its light. And, if for a moment he could be honest with himself, he enjoyed being around the broad. At present, she was about the only person who injected any humor at all into his life. That had to be worth something.<p>

As if on cue, "And here he comes, dragging his feet like fucking _Night of the Living Dead_." She threw her head his direction. "If this ship were carpeted, it would be completely ruined."

She was bent over the keyboard of the computer, pecking purposefully at the keys, on some kind of mission. He sauntered behind the couch, hands in pockets, and came to stand behind her.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"If you wanna beat this wrap, you're gonna need a lawyer. A real good one."

He was completely taken off guard. "A what?"

"A lawyer, you blockhead."

"That's a new one," he stated irritably. "I think you're getting a little wound up about this. I don't need a lawyer."

"If you don't need a lawyer now, when exactly would you need one?"

He rolled his eyes, trying to play off her concern. "I don't even know what kind of trouble I'm in yet."

She looked at him flatly. "Yes, you do."

"And just how the hell am I supposed to afford that?"

She turned away breezily, already prepared with an answer.

"Easy. Blackmail one."

* * *

><p>AN: A quick thanks to everyone who has taken the time to review this story. It's been a pleasure reading your comments.


	9. The Ballad Of El Goodo

**Bad: Chapter 8**

"_Years ago, my heart was set to live, oh  
>But I've been trying hard against unbelievable odds<br>It gets so hard at times like now to hold on  
>My guns they're waiting to be stuck by<br>At my side is God"_

_- _Big Star

* * *

><p>The thing about dads is, no matter if they're good or bad, you always feel the need to prove something to them.<p>

Faye had spent a blissful three years, floating idly around the galaxy, not having to worry much about this. She had no impulse to affirm her value as a person to a father who didn't love her, nor was she concerned with meeting the expectations of one who did. She didn't know what kind of father she'd had, had no idea how he would feel about having a gambling addicted, con-artist-turned-bounty-hunter for a daughter, and was so able to live with a freedom most people never get to experience.

Things were different now.

After the initial assault of memories, the booming crescendo that subsided to low-fi static, the revelation that she was someone's daughter had come on strong and fast.

At first, there had been some spite. It was her father's business trip, after all, that had killed her mother and stolen her memories.

Her father was a driven, educated man, always set on the path that would provide him with the most knowledge, the most opportunities, the greatest advantages. As such, when the prospect of becoming the first non-military surgeon to permanently reside in space became a very real scenario, he'd begun to put the wheels in motion. She remembered standing in the doorway of his dark oak study, the evening sun pouring in behind him as he told her of his plans. The first step was to visit the colony, see if it would be a suitable enough environment to re-locate a family to. Their life on Earth was comfortable in way that their lives in space could not be, and that was a great concern to her mother. Faye herself had been curiously indifferent. Much to her parents' mutual concern, she'd yet to declare a major and honestly wasn't sure what she was going to do when her junior year rolled around. Taking some time off of school was an extremely welcome scenario, but Earth was home.

That was as far as they'd gotten.

Then so what if when she looked in the mirror and saw herself dressed as well as a common streetwalker did she feel her father's disapproval? It was because of that goddamn trip that she was here, and, by God, she'd gotten here all on her own. She'd had nobody and had been no one, but she made her bones in this pitiful galaxy all the same.

Still, she recognized the spite had truly been nothing but a petty way of shielding herself from those feelings of having disappointed the man that had given her the very traits she used to survive. It faded soon, and all that was left in its wake was sadness. Sadness because she knew that even if her father would be more than a little disenchanted with Faye _Valentine_, he would be downright devastated that the person he loved more than anything in the world had been subjected to such a life, especially through any action of his own. And this was the real truth of the matter.

But what was there to do? Maybe now she was somebody, but she was a somebody with a criminal record, massive debts that would crush her if she didn't keep moving, and an appearance and persona that was repugnant to almost anybody who wasn't a complete sleazebag. And still she had no one.

She'd made a mistake trusting Whitney, and she'd spent the last three years reminding herself of that mistake so she would never make it again. She would trust no one, not even those seemingly worth of trust. It was the first memory of her life as Faye Valentine, and it made a lasting impression.

Except now there was Jet. She did trust him, she guessed, but she knew she would never give him the opportunity to prove it. He seemed to care about her, but she suspected some of that was borne merely out of the fact that his best friend was a major fuck-up who he couldn't quite reach anymore. Truly, she was only still here because she had nowhere else to go, and that, she realized, is what had to change.

Standing in the long-abandoned ruins of her childhood home, something lodged in her mind. The bedroom she'd slept in since the day her parents brought her home from the hospital. The sandbox in the backyard where she'd played, her mother and father lounging in the sun, reading. The living room she'd sat in, anxiously awaiting the arrival of her prom date. The driveway where she'd cried and cried as she and her first boyfriend sat in his car, breaking up the summer after high school. It was all gone, gone in a way that it was hard to tell it ever existed. The pain of the loss and the complete lack of anything resembling her former life had ended her quest to recover the past before it even began. She retreated to the Bebop, convinced there was nothing to be had, nothing to be gained by pursuing it any further.

But over the following weeks, sitting awake in her room at night, re-watching that old beta tape until she was sure the celluloid was beginning to break down, her present self, devilish opportunist that she was, began to examine the fragments of her old life.

Certainly there had to be something, somewhere, left of her father's grand estate. Just because the house no longer stood didn't mean there wasn't other, more…mutable equity. Her trust fund, her father's investments, the fortune he'd made as a lab researcher early in his career.

Her rapidly returning memories of her father's portfolio, a fire fed by her insatiable hunger for monetary gain, had given her sudden pause. Was it wrong to be so excited by the idea of reclaiming her father's riches? She began to regret even considering it. Profiting off the deaths of her parents, becoming a space-age grave robber—that was certainly something Faye Valentine would do, albeit guiltily, but was it something _she_ could do?

She began to reluctantly abandon the idea until her father imposed again. She looked at herself in the shadowy mirror of her darkened bedroom and felt for a moment that he could be standing right beside her. There was not a single doubt in her mind that if her father had any say in the matter, not only would he tell her to do it, he would tell her it was _responsibility_ to do it. That if she could chase down a life that been splintered by tragedy and eroded by time then she deserved it. Every penny of it.

* * *

><p>"I don't understand any of this."<p>

"That's not a surprise."

"_Hey. _Rude."

It wasn't a bulletproof plan, but Faye thought it was goddamn brilliant.

"Look, I just need help finding Edward. After that, I'll take care of the rest."

"How do we even start? We have no idea where she is."

"There's this."

Faye passed Jet at piece of thick card stock in the shape of one of Edward's demented smiley faces.

"Where did you get this?"

"It was taped to one of those hacker nerds' monitors. The ones I busted last month. They wouldn't tell me where they got it. Nerds are always so paranoid."

Jet quickly turned his attention to Faye.

"You've had this for a month?"

His tone was accusatory in a way she hadn't heard in a long time.

"Yeah. Why?"

He turned his gaze back to the odd little pennant in his hand. He didn't mean to think so ill of Faye, but the fact that she'd held onto this information until _she_ was ready to use it bothered him.

"You should have said something."

He flipped it over. There was a drawing of an insane-looking black and white bird with the caption 'Kooky burra.'

"I haven't figured that out."

"Well, you're pretty terrible at computers."

"Don't I know it." She stretched her arms above her head, tired from another sleepless night.

Spike sat silent, watching this exchange. It wasn't that he didn't understand _what_ Faye was getting at—it was _why_. There had to be something more to this.

Her plan in a nutshell was to blackmail a shady lawyer she'd met through Gordon Elson by having Edward hack into his private records and probe through his finances. Lawyers were always dirty and mob lawyers were ten times as dirty as the normal ones. One on hand, it seemed like a long shot. On the other, Edward had a way of making things happen.

But as far as he could tell, there was no angle that directly benefited Faye. There was something she was leaving out.

"So, what's in this for you?"

"Excuse me?"

Both Jet and Faye turned to look at him with expressions that were equal part confusion and irritation.

"Why are you doing this? You've obviously had this plan in mind long before yesterday, so what's your stake in this?"

"Money."

"Exactly how do you stand to gain anything from this?"

Faye exhaled forcibly.

"I'm trying to track down some money that belongs to me. That's all you need to know."

"Money that belongs to you that you haven't already spent? That's a laugh."

"Are you in or not? I've offered to cut you in because God knows you'd look fucking ridiculous in one of those orange jumpsuits, but if you're gonna get all suspicious then just fucking forget it."

"I bet you just couldn't wait to use that joke. Bet you were just savin' for the right moment," he said, smirking condescendingly.

"Fuck you."

"I'll look into this thing," Jet cut in, holding up the smiley face.

"Let me know when you know something," Faye said over her shoulder as she disappeared down the hallway toward her room.

Spike watched her go, waiting until he heard the door to her room hiss closed.

"What do you think?"

"It's a little thin, but we've operated on much less."

"I don't know. Something about this seems fishy. What happened, did she suddenly remember she had a bunch of money she'd forgotten about?" he joked.

Jet shrugged, the tapping of keys his only answer.

"Ask her."

"You ask her. She's your pal."

Jet rolled his eyes.

"This is getting old, Spike."

"What? I'm just saying, you guys are chummy. She won't tell me dick."

"Nothing's changed, you know. Everything's always how it was."

Spike shrugged, feigning ignorance.

"The only thing that's different is you."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

Jet stood. "Forget it. I'm not going to argue."

"Fuck that," Spike said, standing himself. "Everything's been fucked up around here since I got back and I'm sick of it."

"And who's fucking fault would that be?!" Jet bellowed. "You're the one that brought this shitstorm down on all of us!"

"You knew who I was when you picked me up. You brought the shitstorm on yourself. I tried to keep you out of it, but you just couldn't butt out. The both of you."

"Well, fuck me. I guess we're real assholes for giving a shit about you."

"Since when do you give a fuck about me? I'm a pariah around here these days."

Without warning, the world turned upside down and he felt his teeth grind against each other loudly, a molar chipping in the process. He looked up at Jet from the floor. He was breathing heavily, his fist still cocked, ready to go to blows should Spike choose to fight back.

"You're fucked-up. You have no idea at all. No idea, you fucking asshole."

The adrenaline had obviously gotten to him, because Jet couldn't seem to complete a coherent sentence.

From the floor, he heard the alarmed staccato of Faye's boots on the metal floor approach from behind.

"What the fuck?!" she shrieked from the doorway.

"Go back to your room! Nobody wants you here!"

"HEY!"

Faye was instantly hurt by Jet's unkind words, but nevertheless hurried to help Spike as he attempted to stand. Spike let himself be assisted only because he couldn't manage on his own.

"You know he's fucking injured, Jet."

"Not too injured to run his goddamn mouth," he spat back, but Faye could see his eyes shining with unshed tears.

She watched as he dejectedly turned and left. She wanted to follow him, but she was still holding onto Spike's arm, keeping him steady.

She guided Spike backward onto the couch, his hand slipping into hers as he slid down. She released it quickly and kneeled sideways next to him-one knee pressed into the couch, the other foot still on the floor. He let her tilt head backwards to keep more blood from dripping down his face. His nose was bloody and his upper lip was split and he tasted blood in his mouth. Punching another man with your steel prosthetic arm didn't seem to be fair.

Faye disappeared for a moment and returned with some toilet paper and dish towel with ice inside.

She handed him the tissues. "Here. Put these in your nose."

He groggily did as he was instructed while she stood over him. She guided the ice toward his face and lifted his hand to hold it. "Hold this on your lip."

He noticed all women liked to play like they were moms to hurt little boys. Like he'd never nursed his own wounds before. Still, he didn't mind. It felt nice to have a woman fret over you.

"What the fuck did you say to him?"

He always forgot that part. After the women were done fretting, they always followed with an interrogation.

"_Nothing_," he said forcefully, his voice muffled by the dish towel.

"Bull_shit_."

Spike took the ice away and dropped his head.

"Can you please just leave me alone?"

"Why are you being like this? All I've done is try to help you. All Jet has done is try to help you, and all you've done is give us shit for it."

_Us._

"Fuck this. I'm outta here."

He used all of his remaining strength to push himself up.

"Where are you going?"

"Away."

She called after him. "You know what, whatever. I don't care anymore."

"Good."

His head was swimming as he stumbled toward the hangar, leaving Faye standing slack-jawed and befuddled behind him, and he coughed violently as he climbed up the side of the Swordfish for the first time in ages. As the pod door closed over his head, he felt as if the whole world was closing in around him and everything began to go dark as he sat in the cockpit of his ship and lost consciousness.


	10. Heron Blue

**Bad: Chapter 9**

"_Her room is painted Heron Blue  
>Lit by candlelight and chandelier<br>And from her headboard perched so high  
>A million dreams have passed her"<em>

_- _Sun Kil Moon

* * *

><p>"You have a nice profile."<p>

"What?"

Spike leaned up from where he'd been laying and brushed his fingertip down her nose. He'd been admiring her dark silhouette against the blue light softly illuminating the gauzy curtains, dense plumes of smoke hanging almost motionless around her in the stillness of the room. She looked like a European model from the 20th century.

"Your nose, your mouth. They look nice. From the side."

Julia passed him the cigarette she'd been smoking, and they laid back down together, her head on his shoulder.

"You're sweet."

"Don't let that get around."

"Mr. Tough-Guy."

"That's why I wear leather jackets. That's what tough guys do. Didn't you know?"

She chuckled lightly.

"Men are all the same. Hard on the outside, fragile on the inside."

"That's a hell of a thought."

She ran her hand over his chest affectionately, almost longingly.

"It's how it is. Men don't know how to handle what they feel, so they have to hide it."

Spike was dubious about her certainty on the matter, but didn't voice his dissention. He enjoyed hearing what she had to say, enjoyed knowing what was in her mind. Julia was a closed book in many ways, and he didn't want to discourage her from sharing herself.

"And what about women?"

"What about them?"

"I've met a lot of women who could do with learning a little restraint," he said, recalling a couple of particularly clingy broads who just couldn't seem to help themselves no matter how many ways he found to say 'no.'

"They can if they choose to. They can choose to be whatever they want. Women are all liars."

"Are you?"

"All women are. It's their nature. You can't change something's nature."

The conversation was beginning to creep into troublesome territory. He felt it best to discontinue any further inquiry else he feared he would begin to ask all those unanswered questions, the ones that were stirring inside him, the ones he pressed down hard all the time. Perhaps there was some validity to her assertion after all.

"Maybe I should get hurt again."

"Why do you say that?"

"I liked having you take care of me," he joked.

She looked up at him then, and he saw what he was certain was love in her eyes.

"You don't have to get hurt for that."

He kissed her slowly, achingly, feeling the love he had seen.

* * *

><p>"When people don't sleep they start going a little cuckoo."<p>

"You're not behaving like a complete basket case."

Through some act of God, they'd managed to lift Spike out of the Swordfish and carry him back to his room. It had been a perplexing adventure. After spending half an hour attempting to rouse him, they discussed the pros and cons of leaving him where he was. The logistics of first getting him out of the ship and then carrying him through the labyrinthine set of corridors between the hangar and his room seemed like an impossible, byzantine task. Somehow, after an hours worth of heave ho-ing, they managed to gracelessly dump him into bed. Jet took on the unsavory task of removing the tissues covered with dried blood from his nose while Faye took off his shoes.

Exhausted and somewhat demoralized, they retired to the bridge. Jet was plugging in data for their next flight plan while Faye had her feet propped up on the console, a magazine in her lap. Jet hated that but said nothing.

"I don't know. All the stuff that's happened. Maybe he's just lost it. He's got all sorts of shit swirling around him all the time," she said, twirling her index finger in the air.

"Everybody's got that."

Jet also hated gossiping this way, but he couldn't help it. Faye was a talker, and there was a topic orbiting their sphere that warranted legitimate discussion, though Jet was typically of the opinion that talking tended to do little to improve such situations and only served to enhance the inherent melodrama of the crisis at hand.

"He lost his woman."

Her tone was casual, but Jet was still surprised that Faye brought Julia up. There had been virtually no mention of her at all in the months following the siege on the Red Dragon headquarters. Still, their one conversation about her had never left his mind in all that time. Faye's description of her had burned his ears and buried itself in his brain. It was in that moment that he felt he would lose Spike forever. It was also when Faye all but confirmed her growing attachment to Spike. The sad envy was easily apparent in her words.

"_Ordinary. The kind of dangerous, beautiful ordinary that you just can't leave alone. Like an angel from the underworld or maybe a devil from Paradise."_

Faye didn't seem to realize that her characterization of Julia was also quite befitting of herself. He supposed that was the moment when Faye had become truly endeared to him. Beneath the smirking glamour queen persona, she was just like any other girl.

All of this had been borne from a single conversation about the mysterious blonde. Maybe she _was_ the reason Spike was losing it. Her effect on their lives seemed to run far deeper than he'd even taken the time to consider. Jet remembered how wildly Spike had behaved when he caught a whiff of her presence on Calypso. Perhaps his current demeanor was a mutation of that, spinning infinitely out of control as there was no longer any potential resolution to it. Julia was dead, but Jet surmised that the spell she'd cast on Spike had not been broken with her passing.

"When someone you really love dies," Faye continued, "it changes you."

Jet opened his mouth to reply, knowing full well that her words were and extension of her own grief, but before he could speak, she dropped her magazine on the console and left.

She really was just like any other girl.

* * *

><p>Regardless of what happened with her blackmail scheme, Faye had decided to move off the ship after all this shit was done.<p>

She really had no idea what she was going to do or what she really wanted for herself. She was still attempting to reconcile her two extremely disparate lives and was far too confused on exactly who _Faye_ was to know what the future would hold. That being said, she knew what she _didn't_ want.

She didn't want to lie, cheat, or steal anymore—at least not in the way she'd grown accustomed to.

Since awaking alone and fearful in this unfamiliar new world, she'd come to learn the virtues of cutting everyone off at the knees to win the race. It was her conclusion that staying a step ahead in the game was the only way to win, and the only way to stay ahead was play dirty. While she did not doubt her current approach was indeed the most appropriate for fast and guaranteed advancement up the food chain, she had begun to notice sharp pangs of guilt and embarrassment now that she was actually taking the time to think about her past misdeeds.

She'd never allowed herself to think too much about how what she'd done might have affected the people she'd disenfranchised. That wasn't to say some of them didn't deserve it—they were just as dirty as she was, if not dirtier. But there were more than a few she'd ripped off that were in straits even more dire than her own, and no doubt her actions had aggravated their circumstances.

Regardless her regrets, she knew her connivery would be a difficult impulse to unravel. This wasn't just a strategy; this was a paradigm, conceived out of necessity in response to lessons learned hard.

Living a lifestyle such as theirs provided her both an abundance of opportunities and justifications to continue practicing the art of , at this point it was both Spike and Jet's expectation that she would attempt to beguile them and everyone else whenever it suited her. She'd recognized the subtle accusation Jet had made earlier today when he questioned why she had withheld information regarding Edward's whereabouts, and, frankly, she didn't blame him. Although it had not been her intent, her actions had been shifty. They would never be able to see her as an honest person even if she meant them no harm. For that reason, she would never be free of this precedent as long as they were her primary companions.

She pressed her forehead against the cold metal door of Spike's room, thankful that perhaps he'd finally be able to get some real rest, even if it wasn't acquired through traditional means.

She'd miss them, yes, but it was all for the best.


	11. Rooms on Fire

**Bad: Chapter 10**

"_Well maybe I'm just thinking that the rooms are all on fire  
>Everytime that you walk in the room<br>Well there is magic all around you, if I do say so myself  
>I have known this much longer than I've known you "<em>

- Stevie Nicks

* * *

><p>Spike thought perhaps he should just stay in his room for awhile. Every time he ventured out into the world shit seemed to go horribly wrong for him.<p>

Something had changed. Some magical foreign particle had entered into his universe, something noxious that could glide through the air, tearing tiny holes through the layers of flesh and metal that had taken shape around him—holes that just grew and grew and didn't seem to stop. Now there were just empty voids where it had come and gone, black nothingness that could never be recovered.

He pushed himself out of bed, feeling crankily uncomfortable for having slept in his clothes, and stripped down to his boxers. He lit a cigarette and sat, elbows on his knees, on the edge of his bed, testing his bruised face to find the source of the most pain.

He'd slept. The sensation of waking from a deep sleep had seemed so unfamiliar to him that for a moment, in the bleary haze of sleep inertia, he had been certain that he had died. It seemed to him that he had never felt more light and peaceful, and yet there was also a feeling doom that seized him. He jolted awake, feeling that he'd just escaped some unnamed horror that was more infinite, more incomprehensible than anything he could ever hope to imagine.

That aside, he felt pretty fucking good.

The taut razor wire that had been drawn down the length of his spine had snapped in an instant of pure grace. He felt so much less aggravated and tense—so much more _Spike._ Although, he couldn't help but wonder if his relief was truly the result of a few blessed yet ultimately forgettable hours of sleep or the fact that he'd awoken with a raging hard-on. He hadn't wanted to admit to himself just how worried he really was, but since being injured he'd yet to experience an arousal in any capacity and the most primal of male fears was beginning to eat away at him. What would have been the point of fighting to live if he could never get it up again?

His groggy trance was unexpectedly thrown as he heard a single tap against his door. He rose and slowly approached the source of the noise, standing in the center of his darkened room, waiting for a moment to see if it recurred. When it did not, he tapped the interior control panel, opening the door, suspicious of what was on the other side. He peered out just in time to see Faye's retreating back waltzing unaware toward her room.

"Hey."

She jumped but paused long enough to compose herself before turning to face him.

"Hey."

"Did you knock?"

She opened her mouth a whole second before she spoke. "I was going to, but I figured you were still sleeping."

"What's up?"

"Nothing. I just thought I should check and see if you'd gagged on your own vomit or something."

"And then you...what, decided you didn't really care?"

"Why are you always such an asshole?"

"I'm good at it, I guess."

She cocked an eyebrow and jutted her hip in annoyance. "Ten points."

He leaned forward against the inside of his doorframe, his bare chest pressing against the cold metal, watching as she spun coolly on the rubber heal of her boot, returning to her own world—one he realized he had no honest notion of.

* * *

><p>"When is Spiegel scheduled to come in?"<p>

"Next Friday."

Miles was not pleased. He leaned back in his dark oak chair, the one he'd inherited from the recently ousted DA Jackson Haremore

It was not lost on Miles that perhaps the only reason he'd been elected to his current office was because the recent ex-Mrs. Haremore had testified in divorce court that her husband had taken her to a number of upper crust orgies and attempted to coerce her into acts of supreme debauchery. If Miles' personal quest to go down in history as the one man who stood up to corruption in his city wasn't already a big enough motivator to press hard and fast on this thing with the Red Dragons, then proving to himself and all of the talking head political jerkoffs that he hadn't been made DA simply because his predecessor was a depraved sex addict of the highest order most certainly was.

"That's not good enough. We needed him here yesterday."

The detective was unimpressed with Miles' facile understanding of how to deal with perps.

"He lives on a ship that never stays in one place for more than a few days. He poses a huge flight risk. We've found that if we allow them to come in on their terms, they feel less pressure and are less likely to flee."

"This investigation has barely begun and it's been three months since the incident occurred. We need to rope this thing in fast."

"All due respect, sir, Spiegel has been a civilian for a long time now."

Miles leaned forward over his desk. In his opinion, police sentimentality was one of the root causes of corruption. They were always willing to give even the biggest fuck-ups a pass just for being a "stand-up guy". To Miles, there was very minimal distinction between a good guy and a bad guy. It wasn't that he couldn't appreciate the decency that seemed to exist in even seasoned criminals—it was just that it didn't really matter. Crimes were crimes because they infringed on the rights of others, because they eroded society at the core. There were no two ways about it. If these folks were truly honorable, they would accept that they deserved to be punished and stand tall when their time came.

"And before he was a civilian, he was a thug who muscled people at the behest of bloodthirsty mob bosses who think they are kings among men. Narcissists who laugh as they steal from people like you and me because they see us insects to be stepped on. Men that abide it are at the very least cowards. Men who support it—they're unprincipled criminals who you can be assured have a long history of things to atone for. Some crimes can't be forgotten, no matter how long it's been since they were committed."

The detective sighed. "How do you even know Spiegel is your man?"

"I don't know that he is. But when I meet him, he'll tell me."

* * *

><p>"Do you ever think you're a horrible person?"<p>

Spike had been watching their waiter hustle around the diner, wiping tables, refilling ketchup bottles, never stopping to chit-chat with the other workers who were all sitting at the bar, smoking. They were the only two guests in the whole restaurant, yet this young kid was working like it was lunch hour. Spike was attempting to decide whether or not he admired the kid or pitied him.

"What?"

"Forget it."

"I said 'what?'."

She'd been embarrassed to ask the question to begin with. She was always reluctant to reveal anything personal to Spike, to invite any conversation about what she thought or how she felt. He was such a flip asshole, and he trusted her about as much as he trusted a poisonous snake that he'd been locked in a ten foot by ten foot room with. Likewise, anything or anyone that got near Spike seemed to be subject to potential calamity or sorrow, and Faye had little faith in Spike's willingness to empathize with her should she experience any of this as a result of entering his stratum.

Still, she had found that since her decision to leave had been made, she was becoming braver, more curious. She had things she wanted to say, questions she wanted to ask of him, and as far as she was concerned, there was little reason left to be modest.

She let her head fall back and then forward again, displaying her frustration at his listening skills.

"I said: do you ever think you're a horrible person?"

He smiled roguishly, lifting a fork with a speared triangle of pancake to his mouth, "Trying to tell me something, Faye?"

Again, she let her head fall back against the pink and green striped upholstery. "You're an awful conversationalist, you know."

Spike studied her. She seemed to have given up her strand of inquiry and was now distantly surveying their overachieving waiter.

She was fucking beautiful. And worse, she had now developed that sad, painful beauty that he found so completely alluring.

Since she had moved onto the Bebop, Spike had done his best to cultivate a safe divide between himself and Faye. She was an enemy to the life that he pictured for himself—the one he'd dreamed of for so long. Yes, he'd sat at her blackjack table, and yes he'd done it because he distantly hoped in that distinctly male way that maybe he could pick her up, but that didn't make her special. He had the same whimsical daydream about every beautiful woman he crossed paths with. He didn't think in his wildest dreams that he'd actually end up having to share space with this creature. He'd never lived with a woman in _any_ sense before, and being forced to see her parading around the ship in a bathrobe or having to smell her flowery shampoo in his shower was not something he was prepared for.

Luckily, with every petty theft of their shared resources or every histrionic outburst, Faye made it that much easier for him to keep his distance. Behind those striking emerald eyes and underneath that lovely porcelain skin was a dreadfully imperfect person whose flawless exterior belied all that lay beneath. Her greed, her selfishness—they easily made her less attractive to him.

Even still, he recognized that the remote expanse between them was something that he chose to purposefully reinforce even now. Despite Faye's apparent defects of personality and how terribly he knew he would pay for it later on, it would be easy to give in to her charms. Very easy. And after that there would be no going back. Not for her, and especially not for him. She would drive him crazy the same way Julia had, and he would never recover from it.

His clinical analysis of the situation had the favorable effect of diminishing any temptation he might have ever felt, the power of it deflated by his logical approach, and day-to-day, it was mostly forgotten. But there were times, like now, when none of that shit mattered.

Sitting with her in a dim, empty diner at 5 a.m., the sky beginning to lighten ever so slightly, his sudden and potent desire was like acid in his mouth. A single erection had managed to turn him back into a 14-year-old boy. How embarrassing.

"Are you okay?"

"What?"

"You had this dead look in your eyes."

"Tired."

She stretched. "It's late."

"Why did you ask me that question?"

"What question?"

Spike made an annoyed face.

"Oh, that."

"And?"

"I don't know. It was just a question." She looked down at her hands, scraping dirt from under her fingernails. "I guess I've started to realize I'm not really such a nice girl."

"Do you _really_ want to be one?" Spike asked sharply. Yet another one of Faye's countless flaws was that she seemed to be quite proud of her con artist status, eagerly demonstrating it whenever the opportunity presented itself. It was like her way of saying, 'you'll never get one over on me, so don't bother trying.'

She shrugged, not looking up, still picking her nails, an action which unwittingly heightened her allure.

"I'm not a nice guy. But I guess I'm not the worst. So what?"

"That doesn't seem to make a difference for you. Practically everybody that meets you wants to be your best friend. Even people who want to kill you love you."

"I think that's a bit of an exaggeration."

"I don't."

"So, what, you want to be more liked? I ask again: do you really care about that?"

"No, it's not that. I don't care about being liked."

"Then what?"

"I just don't want to be bad anymore. But maybe it's in my nature. And you can't change that."

In his newly rested mind, it all made sense. It wasn't Faye he was jealous of—it was Jet.

His heart began to race as all the pieces of the puzzle fitted themselves together. His passive anger, his suspicions, his guilt. They pooled sourly in his stomach, and he hated himself for all of it. Hated how distrustful he'd been of Jet, hated how he was betraying the memory of his recently dead lover, hated that despite knowing what an awful disaster it would be, he wanted to possess Faye in a way no man ever had.

This was not a new desire. In some unspoken way, she'd been marked as his since she'd entered their lives. Jet knew it, and Faye knew it, too. Their closeness had upset the tacit dynamic that had been established long ago, and this was the result. He'd never planned to act on his lust—quite the opposite, in fact—but his entitlement had now pushed him to a point of no return.

"Are you fucking angry?" she asked incredulously.

"No," he said severely, throat dry.

"I shouldn't have said anything. You never think anything but the worst of me."

He shook his head, aggravated beyond words. "I need you to tell me right now about this lawyer and the money you're looking for."

"Why do you…?"

"I'm serious. If you want my help, I need to know."

"I didn't say I needed your help. I was offering to help _you_."

"Don't be a fucking infant. If that was the case you would have done it already. You didn't get this idea overnight."

She stared at him, her eyes fiery pits of jade. "You wouldn't understand."

"I'm trying. Very hard. But I'm losing my patience."

She sighed deeply, blowing air forcefully from her lips. "This is going to sound awful."

"Faye—"

"Let me fucking speak," she snapped. She looked down at the table, attempting to start again. "My family on Earth, before the accident, we were very wealthy. Not just a little. A lot. My dad, he had all sorts of investments, bonds, all sorts of shit. I had a trust in my name."

Spike watched her speak, realizing where this was going.

"Anyway, I remember it all. So I'm going to find it, and I'm going to get out of this shit life, and I don't care if it makes me a bad person because I already am one."

Spike cast his eyes skyward, noticing the orange line of sun forming on the horizon in his periphery.

"Jesus, Faye."

"I'm leaving."

She began to push herself up from her seat, but his hand shot out, gripping her forearm, holding it to the table.

"Sit down."

She jerked her arm away from him, causing the dishes on their table to clatter.

"Get over yourself. It's not that bad. I just couldn't believe you were so bent out of shape about it. Maybe it's in bad taste, but with money problems like yours you'd be stupid not to do it. And if it's yours, then don't feel bad about it."

For a moment, he thought she might cry.

"But we have to muscle this asshole lawyer into helping us, maybe even kidnap him, I don't even know."

"So we'll be bad guys for a little while. You said it yourself. How can we do any worse?"


	12. Wild Roses

**Bad: Chapter 11**

_"Why not speak about it now_  
><em>I put things that shade to you<em>  
><em>Maybe I've been dismayed<em>  
><em>Maybe that's the truth"<em>

_- _Hope Sandoval

* * *

><p>"The world we live in and a five-year-old could use a computer better than either of you."<p>

Spike and Faye looked back at Jet like scolded children as he glared at them over his computer screen.

Spike held up his hand in front of his chest, angling his fingers to point at himself, a rogue thumb pointing outward. "Why are you including me?"

"Knowing how to use the Alpha Catch doesn't count. God forbid this ship's programming fails and I'm not here to steer it. Or if I wanted to take a vacation. Do you even know how to do basic system maintenance? Some crew I picked up."

Spike shrugged, shaking his head. "I could figure it out."

"And, you."

"Me?" Faye questioned, pointing quizzically at herself.

"Yes, you. I found this thing in two minutes," he said scornfully, holding up the drawing of the black and white bird on Edward's pennant. "Did you even look at all or are you having a nice little private joke on me?"

"I looked!" Faye threw her arms up, rising from where she'd been perched on the arm of the sofa, sitting precariously with one leg bent under her ass, and circled the coffee table, leaning over Jet's shoulder to inspect his findings.

There it was. White body, black wings, mohawk and all.

"Kookaburra." The photo reflected in Faye's eyes as she studied it blankly.

"Isn't there a song about a Kookaburra?" Spike said, looking upward, attempting to recall. "Or maybe it was a flamingo."

"Terribly helpful."

Spike shrugged a final time and threw his legs onto the sofa, stretching out fully now that Faye had vacated her spot.

"What does it mean?"

"I don't know. It's an Australian bird. That's all there is to know."

"Old Australia or New Australia?"

"Old."

"Do you think that's where she is?"

"Hard to say. We don't even know where this came from. More than likely, it won't help us."

Spike began to hum idly, summoning back the memory of the song, tapping his feet together.

"That's on Earth. That's where we left her."

"_Kookaburra sits…sits…sits in the old elm tree…old gum tree…_"

"We didn't leave her. She left us," Jet reminded her, offended by her characterization of the situation. "With no way to contact her."

"_King of the bush is he…_"

"She's a thirteen-year-old professional hacker who's been wandering around the solar system alone for more than half of her life. If she doesn't want to be found, she won't be."

"Fuck." Faye squeezed the bridge of her nose.

Spike began to whistle a melody to the lyrics.

"That's not helping."

"Wait."

Spike turned to them, his lips still puckered, mid-whistle.

"Yes?"

"I've heard that somewhere, too. That tune."

Faye began to hum to herself quickly, purposefully, jogging her own memory. She held one hand in the air, her fingers dancing, mimicking pressing the keys of piano, Spike and Jet looking on with curious anticipation.

After a short while, she shook her head.

"No good."

"Eh." Spike laid back on the sofa. This whole thing was quickly becoming ridiculous in a way he despised.

"Maybe we should start thinking about a contingency plan."

"Like what?" Faye demanded.

Jet sighed. "I don't know."

"There's no other plan. This _is_ the plan."

Jet felt an argument coming on. He decided to cut it off at the pass.

"I'll keep looking."

Faye sighed deeply and rubbed her forehead. "I'm going out." And with no further preamble, she strode out of the common area toward the hangar.

"What's eating her?"

Spike replied with an indifferent expression. "Hell if I know."

"Moody broad."

* * *

><p>Fucking <em>Europa<em> of all places. Where the days were deathly hot and the nights were deathly cold. And now half of it was on fire.

Faye strolled waywardly through the streets of the tiny desert town, flakes of white ash falling all around, the air pungent with the smell of fresh cinder. If she wasn't so miserable, it would have been quite lovely.

They'd tracked a bounty here only to find that a wildfire had started half an hour before they'd entered the atmosphere. All the police activity in the area had chased off all the drifters and criminals, leaving nothing but bored townsfolk, sitting out on their porches, watching the flames roll down the mountainside at dusk.

Now, in the early morning hours, even they had disappeared. So it was just her and the sound of gravel under her feet.

She sat down on the curb in the orange cast of a lonely streetlamp and lit a cigarette. The air was dry and hot, but the intermittent breeze seemed to appear at the exact moment that the temperature became unbearable, and then swiftly died away again.

Faye hugged her knees and rested her chin on her arms, listening to the crickets singing to the moon.

She should have known this was a stupid idea. She was a petty con, not a criminal mastermind. Her tricks were short-lived and inspired by impulse. She played the cards in front of her and cut loose as quickly as she could reasonably justify. This kind of thing took patience and careful planning, and it was already starting to come apart before it even began.

Her insides were bound up wretchedly. If she couldn't work this thing out, she was fucked. They were all fucked, Spike especially.

Their seemingly innocuous 3 a.m. breakfast had proved to be anything but. Since Spike's return to the ship, she had felt herself pulling free, extracting her heart from the emotional entanglement she had awoken in many months ago. But with this single shared excursion she felt all of the strands go taut again, roughly drawing her back in. The confused intimacy of their conversation had insidiously pervaded her thoughts for the past three days, drudging up all of the acute anguish she'd experienced in those chaotic final days.

She took a drag off her cigarette and flicked it into the street in front of her.

"How gauche. This whole town could burn up, you know."

"In case you hadn't noticed, the fire's already started."

Spike emerged from the darkness, hands shoved deep into his pockets, and stepped up onto the curb, leaning against the lamppost.

"What's the word?"

"Nothing yet. Jet's gone to bed."

"Lucky him."

"How long has it been since you really slept?" he asked, almost too softly.

She buried her face in her palms. "Forever. Seems like forever."

Spike looked down at her. Sometimes she was such a kid.

"I think I'm starting to lose it."

"Well, if you want, I could knock you out cold like Jet did me."

She waved her hand in front of her face. "This is the moneymaker, Spike."

He chuckled.

She stared out into the blackness, studying the bright orange peak of the mountain where the fire was still blazing. "Aren't you nervous? What if this doesn't pan out?"

He kicked at the ground absently. "Whatever happens, happens."

She scoffed. "Isn't that the mentality that got you in this mess in the first place?"

"What can I do, Faye? Please, edify me."

She stood. "Oh, I don't know, how about give half a shit about _something_?"

"I'm not going to get into this again."

"Of course not." She snorted, smiling bitterly to herself, and began to depart.

"Don't take this shit out on me," he called after her. "I didn't do anything."

She turned to look at him. "You're so fucking clueless."

"What?"

She turned away again, intending to leave him standing in the dark, his unanswered question hanging in the air. Instead, she felt a hand grip her shoulder and spin her around.

"Don't walk away. I'm trying to talk to you."

"You can. Why can't I?"

"Goddamn, that's childish."

"Leave me alone, Spike."

"Or what, you'll try to shoot me again?"

"Fuck you!" she spat, jabbing her finger in his chest. "Everything's a fucking joke to you." She drew back, gesturing wildly. "Someone, I don't know, fucking shows you something, and you just piss all over it like it's nothing."

"That's not what I did," he said, his voice grave.

"Yes, it is. I was fucking standing there like a fool, fucking _pleading_, and it's like you don't even remember or fucking care at all."

He felt his temper beginning to flare. He squeezed his fists tighter in his pockets, focusing only on maintaining his composure. "I didn't forget, but I certainly fucking appreciate you reminding me of all the pain I've caused."

"How horrible that must be. I'm sure it's way worse than being pushed aside and told what you feel doesn't matter."

"I gave you my reasons, Faye. Maybe they weren't good enough for you, but they were for me."

At once, she seemed to lose all steam.

"I don't think I can be around you, Spike."

He stepped forward, exasperated. "Don't be like that. I'm sorry."

"You don't even know what you're apologizing for."

"Yes, I do. I never meant to hurt your feelings, and I'm sorry for it."

"That's not going to do it for me."

"What else can I say?"

She sighed, dejected, exhausted beyond words. "I don't know."

He watched her standing before him, attempting to pretend that he wasn't there, rubbing her eyes, blocking him from her view. Anger had flooded his entire body. What gave her the right to vilify him? She had no idea at all about his life, did not know his choices or the ways he had suffered. He wanted to storm away and never look back, whatever friendship was between them be damned. But as he watched her, he saw her genuine, undeniable sadness and his anger subsided to guilt.

Lacking any words, he did the only thing he could—hastily, so she couldn't fight it, he slid his arms around her and pulled her to him, embracing her. She froze, but despite his impulsivity, he remained resolute, holding her tiny body against him.

He wanted to speak again, to say that he knew why she didn't believe him when he said he was sorry, but when her arms came up to rest around his shoulders and he heard muffled sniffling against his chest, he was silenced.


	13. Old Time Rock and Roll

**Bad: Chapter 12**

"_Call me a relic, call me what you will  
>Say I'm old-fashioned, say I'm over the hill<br>Today's music ain't got the same soul  
>I like that old time rock 'n' roll<em>_"_

- Bob Seger

* * *

><p>It had been far too long since he'd been out on the hunt.<p>

As much as Jet enjoyed the intellectual satisfaction that came from being a detective, he never lost the taste for being on the beat. He liked to think of himself as a renaissance man in that way. He enjoyed reading, clipping his bonsai, and smashing skulls.

He cast his eyes down the bar at Spike and Faye. Those two, they were from a different age. Spike was too lazy to learn how to do anything useful with his life and fancied himself the star of his own genre-meshing, kung-fu gangster movie. With Faye, everything was an elaborate game of intrigue that was played to win, and she too had her own delusions of cinematic grandeur.

For Jet, bounty hunting was a man's way of life. No bureaucracy, no bullshit—just the perpetual rough and tumble, the honorable men against the wicked.

Okay, so maybe it was the moderately honorable men against the slightly less honorable, but there was still The Line—the one between the hunter and hunted, and that line was respected. You were either on one side or the other, and everyone knew which side _they_ were on.

Moreover, it was a place where he always knew he would be valued. In bounty hunting, he was an imposing force. In other aspects of his life, he was often made to play passive roles—to his crew, he was the straight man, left to clean up after his reckless, freewheeling partners. To Alisa, he had been the overprotective boyfriend, spending years afterward wondering what had gone wrong. When everything else in his life failed to satisfy him, he always had this.

It was for all those reasons that he loved his job, no matter how shitty it was at times.

And goddamnit, it could be a lot of fun.

* * *

><p>Faye was tapping her boot against the metal support along the bottom of her stool, nodding her head to the music. Spike was turned around backwards, his elbows resting on the bar behind him, his neck slack as he gazed up at the ceiling, a cigarette pursed in his lips. Jet was watching everything around him in the mirrored wall behind the bartender. All three pretended not to notice the entrance of a short man in a white suit with a matching white fedora and cape, flanked on both sides by rather sorry-looking cronies.<p>

Spike looked on, shaking his head. "Look at this asshole."

Faye leaned in and murmured in a low voice, "What's with these guys he's got with him? Seems like their dads got a little friendly with their sisters."

Jet had to admit, they looked very dim and strangely hideous. This territory was not known for its educated and progressive populace, nor was it known for its transparency or sense of justice. A lot of strange things happened in these parts, things that were only known to the locals—lots of crimes that went unreported or uninvestigated. While this was certainly not unusual for a rural, impoverished area such as this, a certain number of events seemed to point back to a slippery, two-bit wiseguy—Landon Aspley. While anyone with half a brain could see this man was an unmitigated idiot, it appeared that he had some influence over the people here—likely due to his ties to much more sophisticated criminal entities. He was holed up in a big mansion across the river that was guarded at all times by townspeople he had hired, but made regular stops at the clubhouses in town to make his collections. He was wanted on suspicions of racketeering and fraud—a cool two million.

"There's a lot of muscle around him. We're a little outmatched."

Spike smirked, his trademark bravado making its scheduled appearance. "Aren't we always?"

"Are you ready for his?" Jet asked quietly.

"I've done it in worse shape before."

Jet's mouth twisted, his expression solemn. Maybe this was a mistake.

"Let's play a game," Faye whispered brightly.

"Ugh," Spike grunted. "Can we have one outing where you don't say that?"

It could have been the shot of Bulleit, the fact that he hadn't been on a real chase in months, or possibly even because he feared what might happened if Spike took this thing head-on as he clearly intended, but Jet found that he was down for a little of Faye's brand of cat-and-mouse.

"Whatcha got in mind?"

"Just follow my lead."

And with that, she hopped down from her stool and began sauntering toward their bounty head.

"She's gonna fuck this up for us," Spike whispered, pursing his lips in disdain. He turned around, not wanting to witness their two million slide from his grasp. "I'm just gonna get wasted and go home."

"Hold on. Just watch."

Faye had already engaged Landon in conversation, sitting on the edge of the heavy wooden table where he was seated, laughing coquettishly. She pointed over to Jet and Spike, Landon following her finger, eying them with antipathy. Then she waved her hand, gesturing to Landon's crew. Jet looked on curiously. Spike was silent.

Soon, she was seated at their table, a deck of cards suddenly appearing in her hands which she shuffled with trained clumsiness, smiling girlishly. A cocktail waitress appeared with an unmarked bottle of murky liquid and a half-dozen shot glasses.

Faye splayed the cards slowly across the table, pretending to be a little unsure of her form. Landon, Faye, and each of his cohorts picked a card at the same time, holding it up for the table to see. They all 'ooh-ed' and pointed at one of the big, muscled henchmen. Faye handed him a shot glass, full to the brim of cloudy liquid, which he shot quickly and slammed on the table.

Jet had to turn away to hide the giant grin that came across his face.

"Crafty little wench."

It was a simple, stupidly brilliant trick. Cheat them at high-low, a game of zero skill, get them all liquored up, and watch 'em fall.

Jet turned back just in time to catch round two which Faye purposefully lost. She held up her hands, waving them playfully, laughing, allowing Landon to pour her losing shot. She lifted the glass to her lips, and tilted her head back to down her shot, but not before meeting Jet's eyes and winking quickly.

"She's a huge pain in the ass, but she's got it," Jet said, admiringly.

"Yeah," Spike said vaguely, his gaze trained unwaveringly on the scene before him.

* * *

><p>"I'm <em>drunk<em>. I wanna go home!"

"We gotta wait for the cops."

"Why are they taking so long?" Faye whined.

It had taken about two hours, but Faye's plan had worked like gangbusters. Landon and his crew were tied up and sitting in the middle of the sopping wet barroom floor, all the tables and chairs pushed to the edges of the hall in the scuffle, bottles of liquor emptied unceremoniously on the hardwoods. The staff was cowering behind the bar, still frightened by the sudden and swift outburst of violence. Spike sat, elbows on his knees, head dropped, breathing heavily, with his gun held between his legs.

"Yo, Spike. You okay?"

"I'm fine," he said shakily, his hand absently rubbing his stomach.

Faye was sitting on the floor next to Spike's chair. She patted his leg heavily. "He'll be fine," she slurred with unconvincing conviction.

She placed a hand against her forehead, and groaned. "I think I'm gonna puke."

"Why'd you get so drunk? You didn't have to," Spike said irritably.

"I didn't mean to. It was moonshine. I thought I could handle it."

"Why the hell did you order moonshine?"

She thrust her arms out in front of her, "Duh! So they'd get drunk faster."

Spike shook his head, forcing away the sound of her overly loud voice, queasiness overtaking his thoughts. "I think I'm gonna puke, too."

Jet leaned against the bar watching, appreciating the absurd chaos of their present situation. Faye was lightly patting Spike's foot as a means ineffectual comfort, blinking long slow blinks, trying not to fall asleep. Spike was holding his stomach with both arms, looking like he was about to kick Faye any second, obviously not wanting to be touched.

He loved both of them. He was a silly old fool.

* * *

><p>Somehow, they all managed to get back to the ship with minor incident. Only Faye had vomited, but she seemed to cheer up pretty quickly after that, posing comically in the fedora she'd lifted from Landon.<p>

Spike and Faye retired to their rooms, but Jet found he was too wired to sleep. He sat in the darkness, enjoying the couch he rarely got a chance to sit on, smoking a fantastic cigarette.

He tapped the computer's keyboard, waking it from its slumber, the screen taking a moment to warm to its full brightness.

Edward. He had to find Edward. Jet found he was still wounded about her leaving. He hated to think of her all on her own again, wandering Earth, trying to find a father that didn't deserve her. Spike was his best friend, but he realized in time that Edward was his favorite. Her innocence was endearing, and she was smart as a whip despite her oddball tendencies. And unlike the other two, she actually listened to what he had to say.

He opened a command prompt.

**Login as: Edward**

The computer protested.

**Invalid user**

He tried more names in rapid succession—RadicalEdward, Ein, Einstein, Tomato, Appledelhi—none of which returned any result.

He sighed deeply and thought for a long moment.

**Login as: Francoise**

Instantly, a keypad with seemingly unrelated letters appeared on the screen. Jet's eyes went wide.

_Bingo._

* * *

><p>AN:

Two quick things: thanks to everyone for your lovely reviews. I read them all and they make me smile.

Secondly, I've gotten a few comments about the level of swearing I use in my writing. I write in the way that is most comfortable for me, and how I hear the characters in my head. It's not liable to get any better. While the series never had much swearing in it, I think of it as existing in the same pantheon as works such as Pulp Fiction or The Sopranos—both mature works of fiction with people who use cursing as a regular form of expression. I don't view the level of vulgarity presented here was gratuitous or out-of-character for the Bebop crew simply because the show was not produced in a way that would allow the use of heavy language. I like to think I've freed them to be as they truly are. ;)


	14. Unlit Hallway

**Bad: Chapter 13**

"_Walking down the unlit hallway of life  
>There's hope I know<br>There's an angel she follows me close  
>She touches my shoulder<em>_"_

- Sun Kil Moon

* * *

><p>Faye slammed her fist on the coffee table.<p>

"I'm going to throw this fucking thing out the goddamn window."

"We don't have windows."

"Shut up."

She was parked in front of the computer as she had been for nearly an hour, attempting to do what both Jet and Spike had also failed to accomplish. She ran her hands roughly down her face, stretching her eyelids disturbingly, holding them there as she contemplated.

"Who the fuck do we know that plays music?" she said through her hands.

"We can just hire somebody," Spike said, cracking open a can of soda. The noise irritated Faye even further.

Solving Edward's passcode was proving far more difficult than they'd anticipated. Perhaps that shouldn't have been a surprise, but unraveling the mystery up to this point had been trying enough that there was a sense that this part would be easy.

The keypad was a arranged with letters Faye had been able to identify as those of piano, recalling the mostly unused upright that had been in her childhood bedroom, keys marked with the letters CDEFGAB for beginners.

To Spike, the passcode was clearly the Kookaburra song. He couldn't specifically recall, but he assumed the group's shared memory of it must have originated with Edward. Her tendency to babble led to their collective tendency to ignore a large portion of what she said, transforming it more into ambient noise than words. Jet had managed to find the sheet music, but it appeared none of them could read it correctly. Spike had tried for at least two hours today, while Jet had nearly torn all of his remaining hair out working on it all day yesterday.

"We can't be this dumb."

Jet glanced at Spike who looked back, a small smile creeping over his lips.

"Hey, I saw that, you assholes!"

Jet noticed how little hostility there had been between the two men of late. He couldn't quite put his finger on what had changed, but maybe nothing had. Maybe it was just the healing process running its course. The pink vertical line on Spike's mouth where he'd split his lip when he punched him was beginning to fade, and Jet mused poetically that perhaps when it was fully gone, then too would be Spike's grief.

"We have four days to get our shit together. This is serious."

"Didn't you spend most of yesterday laying around with a hangover?"

Faye made a face. "I guess I'll keep that two million for myself then."

Neither man had any rebuttal.

"That's what I thought," she said haughtily.

"You know, we could have nabbed that guy without you having to get piss drunk."

"Oh really, gimpy?"

Spike's recent physical endeavors had put significant of strain on his bad leg, leaving him with an ugly limp yet again. While he was washing dishes yesterday, Jet had internally groaned when he'd caught a glimpse of Spike limping past the kitchen, thinking of all the physical therapy they would have to redo and all of the childish bellyaching he'd have to put up with along the way.

Spike's eyes narrowed into slits and he rubbed his thigh unthinkingly but said nothing.

Jet broke in, his instinct as the pack leader heightening, certain that these two dogs would soon be trying to rip out each others throats.

"I know a guy on Mars. He plays at a piano bar. We can take it to him. We gotta start heading that direction anyway."

It hung in the air, the feeling of foreboding. All of them had been very lucky up until this point in their lives. Despite all of their unscrupulous dealings and associations, they'd always been able to fly under the radar of Johnny Law. It was almost surreal, suddenly having this new worry thrust upon them. They weren't the good guys per se, but under ordinary circumstances, as bounty hunters, they were protected as entities of the system.

Both Faye and Jet seemed to realize Spike's discomfort with his own fate and averted their eyes.

He rose from his seat and began to leave, pulling his leg behind him.

"I'll keep trying," Faye volunteered.

He stopped. "I'll be in my room."

* * *

><p>The odor of dead flowers wafted up through the air, mixing with the smell of rain.<p>

Her hand gripped his bicep, and he looked down, noticing her nails were painted bright red. The coppery scent of blood flashed in his mind.

"Do you want to leave?"

"No." He said. "Never."

They were slow-dancing in the graveyard. Night had fallen some time ago. A fine mist was hanging around them.

"If you stay, you'll die."

"I've dealt with that before."

She looked up at him, her icy blue eyes so striking against her golden hair. She didn't cry. He'd never seen her cry.

"I wish you were happy."

"I've never been happy. Except with you."

"You're a good man, Spike. That's why I loved you."

He hugged her to him, desperately gripping her, knowing she was soon to depart. He looked down and saw the grave they were dancing on was marked with her name.

He began to cry.

* * *

><p>Spike woke with a jolt, a strange noise coming from his throat. He sat up in bed, remembering his dream vividly. Depression washed over him in an instant, and in this moment he was certain beyond any doubt that no good would ever come to him again.<p>

He breathed heavily, trying to will away the images, but even more tortured memories began to surface. Their first kiss. He'd never been so happy. He walked home with a skip in his step, any guilt or worry be damned. The time they'd driven along the coast and her scarf blew away, and he parked the car and scaled half an oceanside cliff in the dark to retrieve it.

Why, oh, why hadn't she just come with him when he'd asked? Surely there had to be a way, even with Vicious' awful plan. Why hadn't she come for him?

He'd been sitting in a bar, trying to kill his thoughts of her, and then there was Jet. He thought Spike was funny. Bounty hunting was never even something that would have occurred to him to take up without Jet's suggestion.

The twisted path of his life was winding itself around his neck, choking him.

He began to panic. How was it possible that he was the only person still left alive who knew her? That if he were to die, it would be as though she never existed? Shouldn't everyone know that she was loved and she was missed?

He lay back down, feeling his mania, aware of his irrationality. His eyes were wet with unshed tears and he wondered why he couldn't cry for her.

* * *

><p>Faye awoke laying face down on the sofa, the television playing dully in the background. She roused herself slowly, blinking, confused about how she'd gotten here in the first place.<p>

She lifted her head a little, sensing a presence. Spike was sitting in the chair to the left of the sofa, staring intently into the screen—watching some Asian movie about a guy with rice all over his face, talking about how the rice was like his father and mother.

Feeling instantly vulnerable, she worried she may have been drooling, as she tended to do when sleeping on the couch. Or worse, snoring. She reached up to touch her cheek, testing for any residue.

"You weren't drooling. But you were snoring," Spike said without looking at her.

She pushed herself up into a sitting position, legs bent underneath her, scowling and reaching up to pat down her untamed hair.

"I was not."

"Oh, yes, you were. And talking, too."

Her blood ran cold for a moment. She had too many secrets too feel comfortable with that knowledge. She hated the idea that anyone could have access to her unfiltered thoughts.

"What did I say?"

"I don't know. Some shit about dog racing."

_Phew. Safe._

She smiled fondly to herself, "I'm always chasing it, even in my sleep. I always dream about my losses."

The irony of her statement was not lost on Spike.

He'd been unable to get back to sleep following his nightmare. His heart felt hollow and cold, and there was an image in his mind of him being at the bottom of an empty stone well, the blue light of the moon miles away.

He watched in his periphery as she combed her fingernails through her hair, lifting it from her pale, slender neck and pulling it into a high ponytail, her bangs falling over her forehead, brushing her temple.

"What time is?" she yawned.

"About six," he guessed.

"Did we land?"

"Around four. Jet just went to bed."

She rose from the couch, stretching her arms above her head, lost in her large sweatshirt. "Wanna smoke?"

"Sure." He rose carefully, the pain in his leg immediate.

She picked up her cigarettes from the coffee table, watching him.

"Need help?"

"Nah, I'm fine."

"You can hang onto me if you want."

He regarded her carefully. There were times when she seemed so…disarmed, so decent. It almost irritated him how shattered her personality could be. You never really knew which Faye you were dealing with.

Despite his better judgment, he nodded.

She came to stand beside him, and he put his hand on her shoulder, allowing her to lead him out to the flight deck, guiding him in very much the same way she had done nearly two months ago when he first returned to the ship. He realized as they walked through the silent corridors how differently he had felt then. Despite the depression that had been prompted by his nightmare, he had a feeling of greater wholeness now, something to help combat the sadness that had threatened to crush him completely before.

He'd never wanted to lose that feeling of deep sorrow, believing that by allowing himself to overcome it, he was choosing to lose her forever. But time wore on, it seemed, and now he knew he never wanted to feel that way again.

Faye pushed open the hangar door, and together they stepped out onto the deck. He released her shoulder and leaned against the larger loading gate doors, struck with a feeling of peace and nostalgia at the incense of the morning dew and ocean air.

They each lit a cigarette, watching as the dawn stars faded into the blue nothingness of sunrise.

* * *

><p>AN: I'd originally intended to write a very brisk twenty chapter story that was mostly dialogue (as evidenced in the the earlier chapters), but this thing is sorta growing a life of its own. I hope it's not moving too slowly for you guys. We've got two big chapters coming up.


	15. Alcoholiday, Part 1

**Bad: Chapter 14**

"_There are things I want to do but I don't know  
>If they will be with you<br>There are things I want to say but I don't know  
>If they will be to you<em>_"_

- Teenage Fanclub

* * *

><p>Spike couldn't say this was how he expected his day to go. At the same time, it was sort of a relief that the feeling of inevitability he'd been plagued by since the day Faye Valentine had entered his life had now reached its inescapable conclusion and he did not have to fear it any longer.<p>

She lay beside him on her stomach, hugging a pillow, dozing lightly in the retreating hours of the afternoon, her naked back curving down to that perfect ass, her bare legs half under the sheets. Her cherry lipstick, usually so artfully drawn was now carelessly smeared, a whisper of its former hue. He didn't dare survey his own body, fearing he would find traces of it everywhere, and that he would become instantly aroused at the sight of it, recalling the path that her mouth had followed.

He felt a little bad for the girl. She'd been holding all the cards this whole time and she hadn't even known it. Still didn't know it.

His comm. unit rang suddenly, startling him and waking Faye.

It was Jet.

He muted the video, and answered hesitantly.

"Yo."

"Yo."

"Were you sleeping?"

"Eh, something like that."

"It's four in the afternoon."

"I was tired. What's up?"

"I won't be home until later. I'm gonna hang around and watch Neil play."

"Did he tell you what we were doing wrong?"

"Yeah. I'll tell you all about it."

"Alright. When will you be back so I can tell Faye?"

"I don't know. Midnight maybe."

"Alright. I'll talk to you later."

"Bye."

"Bye."

* * *

><p>Jet woke around 9 a.m., finding he was very anxious to get a resolution to this lousy mystery. As a detective, the stuff with Edward had made a sorry joke out of him.<p>

Neil Northand—better known by his stage name Neil Nightingale—was a CI turned friend. He'd gotten in trouble dealing a bit of blow out of the club he worked in, and he was not remotely prepared to do time over it. He was too pretty, built rather small, and he was an artist to boot—a virtuoso pianist since childhood who'd blunted his own talent through drinking and partying. Normally, snitches were not friend material in Jet's eyes, but Neil was a heck of a guy. He was charming as all get-out, he always wore a royal blue sequined blazer, and he knew how to jam. He played it hot and messy then cooled it down slow and fine. He was forced to play a lot of cheesy, ostentatious piano bar nonsense that Jet hated, but he was a blues and jazz man at heart.

He'd be happy to help, and Jet couldn't help but be a little excited the he'd get to have some more congenial company for awhile.

"If you leave the ship, make sure to lock up. We almost got ransacked the last time we were here."

"That security guard is never where he's supposed to be. What's he doing all day?"

Spike was staring down at the floor, brow furrowed, a million miles away.

"Earth to Spike."

"Eh?"

"Are you going out today?"

"Yeah."

Jet looked back at him knowingly. This was the first time they'd been back to Tharsis since he'd been released from the hospital. No doubt Spike had some unfinished business he felt the need to attend to.

"Maybe you should stay here."

He shook his head.

Jet sighed. It had been a ceremonial protest anyhow.

"Be careful then."

He noticed Faye was already dressed and made up, wearing—as Spike referred to them—one of her 'costumes,' a gauzy white thing that, in Jet's opinion, was about as demure as being wrapped in a bed sheet.

"What about you?"

"I'm off to the bank to invest my part of that two million. You know, expand my portfolio a bit."

Jet rolled his eyes. Money in one hand and right out the other.

"I'm not going to blow it all. Just some of it."

"On what? Slot machines and a gallon of Four Roses?"

"Crêpes and bottomless mimosas, actually."

Jet stared back unblinkingly._ Much_ more congenial company.

* * *

><p>Faye was walking on sunshine.<p>

They were _this close_ to finding Edward, she had money in her pocket, she had an amazing oversized sun hat that made her look like the rich, snobby wife of some aristocrat, and she didn't have a damn thing to do all day. Everything was comin' up Faye.

The hard wooden soles of her sandals made a pleasant clapping sound as she moseyed along the docks, her flimsy sundress billowing about in the wind, heading toward the city. Her plans were simple and sweet: get a nice, succulent breakfast at a French revivalist cafe along the shore and get plastered on champagne. Night drinking could end up being terribly depressing if you weren't careful, but day drinking, that was never a bad idea in her experience. She would sit out on the patio and bake in the summer sun, enjoying solitude. And if it so happened a fetching gentleman cared to join her, that would be fine, too. She was up for whatever came her way.

The roaring of a jet engine approached from behind and she turned just in time to see the Swordfish zoom by overhead.

Shielding her eyes from the sun, she frowned a little, watching the rust colored space racer disappear into the horizon. She supposed she should know by now that some things simply never turn around, never go the way you want no matter how badly you want it…

...but some types of disappointments, you never get used to.

She smiled sadly to herself and continued walking.

_Let it be._

* * *

><p>Spike swallowed hard, his mouth uncomfortably dry.<p>

He wasn't nervous per se, just…unsettled. He wanted to know, but at the same time he didn't.

Laughing Bull's tent stood tall amidst the garbage and weeds, a round circle of ash and cinders still smoldering from a fire that had burned the night before. Spike regarded the teepee through the thin smoke, watching as it appeared to shift in form like a mirage, the heat waves oscillating fluidly between him and his destination. One second it looked like paradise—by the next it had transformed to hell.

_Oh, what the fuck?_

Determined to squash his own theatrics, he pushed himself forward at half a sprint, throwing open the curtain with little regard for courtesy.

It was empty.

He re-emerged instantly, scanning his surroundings, feeling as though he'd been drawn unwittingly into an inscrutable enigma.

He moved out of the tent completely, coming to stand at his full height in the center of the clearing, looking out at the river, having no idea what to do next.

* * *

><p>"Show me how you've been trying it."<p>

Jet plugged the data chip into Neil's computer. A replicated version of the passcode lock appeared onscreen as well as a digital copy of the sheet music, and Jet began to play the notes slowly as he read them off the page.

Neil put up his hand.

"I'm going to stop you here."

"What's up?"

"See this symbol," he said, pointing to the stanza on the page. "It means sharp. That's how you've got to play the notes."

The keypad only had letters as far as Jet could tell.

"How the hell am I supposed to do that?"

"You've got the symbol on your keyboard."

Jet lifted his hands to inspect they keys in front of him. Sure enough, there is was, all along.

"Try it out."

Jet was a little hesitant.

"I'm not sure what will happen if I do. Your computer might get some sort of virus that puts smiley faces all over it."

Neil chuckled. "In that case, don't."

Jet removed the data chip. "I'll be in town for a couple of days. If that doesn't work, I might need to come back."

Neil moved to the sidebar, his bright white poplin shirt ablaze in the morning sun blasting through the floor-to-ceiling windows. "No problem. I'm always here."

Jet's eyes drifted over Neil's living room. It was elegant and traditional—all light-colored wood, low-sitting furniture, whites and beiges and seafoam greens. He imagined he must look like a dark smudge on a white rug.

Neil handed him a scotch which he regarded curiously being that it was only noon.

"Thanks."

"How's the day job?" he queried, falling into a chair across from Jet.

Jet shrugged easily, amused at the ridiculousness of his current situation. "Seems like it gets stranger all the time."

"Tell me more."

"Eh," he settled into the couch. "Seems like everyone I meet out there is just a little…off. I've gotten too used to hanging around freaks."

Neil smiled knowingly. "You've always been like that, though. Look at where you are right now."

"I don't follow."

"Most people don't have friends that used to be their confidential informants. Most people meet people through other people that they've met through their bullshit jobs or school or whatever."

"What's your point?"

"My point is you're attracted to that life. How it got to be that way, I don't know, but there's gotta be a reason you're still doing it."

Jet looked down at the trendy, asymmetrical glass coffee table.

"I don't want it to be that way. I guess I just don't know how to do anything else."

"Jet, you're one of the smartest chaps I ever met, and you could be a lot of things if you wanted, but you can't take anybody tellin' ya what to do. That's what you and every other bounty hunter in this galaxy have in common."

"You're right. I know you're right."

"So what's the problem?"

Jet focused squarely on the patch of floor shadowed beneath the translucent coffee table, wondering idly if an artist were to sketch this how they would shade it to portray the appropriate depth.

"I've realized that kind of freedom comes at a high price."

* * *

><p>Faye had finished a whole pitcher of mimosa and was about to start on her second when Spike intruded.<p>

She'd been sitting with her arms crossed and resting on the table, her eyes closed, watching through her eyelids as the clouds passed over the sun, the light dimming and then reappearing in a steady rhythm.

Across from her, she felt the vibration of a chair being slid out from beneath the table.

"Look, if you're gonna try to hit on me, you should know upfront that I expect you to pay my check."

"That's rather prosaic."

Her eyes flashed open. Spike had already kicked his feet up onto the wooden railing of the deck, and was beginning to light a cigarette.

"At least now I know what the terms are."

She scowled and straightened up, taking a defensive stance.

"What are you doing here, Spike?"

He shrugged. "My plans fell through."

"Ah, so you decided to ruin mine."

"And you say _I'm_ the asshole."

She didn't retort, hoping he would take the hint and leave. As of late, her plan to avoid him had been less than successful, and her own failure to commit was proving to be a source of some irritation. It seemed like he was always around, always invading her thoughts, and it pissed her off. Surely he had to know by now that her feelings for him were not remotely platonic, and the fact that he kept hanging around her in spite of this knowledge made her angry.

And here he sat, ignoring the fact that he was clearly not wanted. If he was this dense, maybe he hadn't figured it out after all.

"Want me to leave?"

She closed her eyes, rubbing her cheek tiredly.

"No, it's fine."

He was silent awhile longer, staring out at the ocean as the clouds grew thicker, blotting out the sun completely. Their waitress silently brought a second glass over to their table, pouring them each a cocktail from the sweating pitcher, acting as an obedient agent in the universe's plot to make Faye miserable.

She threw her feet up on the adjacent chair, mirroring Spike's pose, clutching her glass to her chest.

"It's turning out that nothing's quite what I thought it was." His voice was deep, taking on a particularly low timbre.

"What happened to 'being fluid, like water'?" she barbed half-heartedly, still feeling quite dour.

He looked at her then, smiling. "I guess I was fooling myself."

"Fuck, I'll drink to that," she said, quickly downing the rest of her cocktail.

She deposited her empty glass back on the table, feeling a droplet of cold rain fall on her extended arm. Spike was still watching her, and for once, she stared right back.

The waitress reappeared, dropping a folded slip of paper on the table as they continued to face off.

Her heart was pounding wildly. She swallowed hard.

"So, you getting the check?"

"Yes," he said forcefully.

She let out a breath she'd been holding.

"Then be quick about it."


	16. Alcoholiday, Part 2

**Bad: Chapter 15**

"_Listen, ever get a feeling when you're taken by the hand  
>And led a course you can't command?<br>Went to bed but I'm not ready  
>Baby, I've been fucked already<em>_"_

- Teenage Fanclub

* * *

><p>Spike's eyes fell closed as he rode out the endorphin explosion in his brain, his body awash with sudden calm, his chest heaving as he battled with his tortured lungs.<p>

"I think you needed that," Faye said breathily.

An easy smile came across his face. "You're goddamn right I did."

They both lay silent, coming down from the height of the thrill, catching their breath.

After awhile, Faye groaned and rolled onto her side, tucking an arm beneath her head. Without looking, Spike dropped his hand to the floor, fumbling around for his abandoned pants. He pulled them up onto his chest, digging in the pockets for his cigarettes.

Following Spike's lead, Faye reached up to grab the ashtray from the table at the head of the bed. He slid two cigarettes between his lips, lighting them at the same time, puffing hard to make sure they both caught spark, and handed one to Faye.

"Thanks," she said, settling back into her relaxed pose as Spike placed the ashtray on his naked chest.

Spike shook his head in amazement, swallowing hard.

"Wow."

"What?" she said, raising a perfectly manicured eyebrow.

"Three fucking years, that's what."

She smiled drowsily, some reverence apparent in her voice. "I didn't know that. That's sweet."

He turned to look at her. "Still buzzed?"

"Oh, yeah," she said. "I better get up. I'm going to fall asleep."

Spike rolled his eyes a little.

"You can sleep here. We don't have to be so fucking conventional."

"Thank God, because I did _not_ want to get up," she said, laughing. She reached over to ash her cigarette.

"So, what _were_ your plans?"

"Eh?"

"You said your plans fell through."

"Oh, nothing. I was gonna go see Bull, but he wasn't there," Spike said, recalling how perturbed he was by his earlier findings.

"What for?"

Spike shook his head. "No reason. Just seemed like I should."

She handed him her cigarette which he stubbed out for her. She rolled onto her stomach, pulling a pillow beneath her.

"You never struck me as the type to believe that shit."

"He's never wrong."

"It'd sure be nice if he could tell us how to get out of this mess," Faye said, her eyes drifting closed.

"Yeah," Spike said absently, distracted by thoughts of his previous encounters will Laughing Bull.

_I was once killed before…by a woman._

_You take women too lightly my friend._

_On the contrary. Catch you later._

He turned to examine Faye who had already nodded off. He refused to regret this. He decided that before he'd even gotten her out of her dress. This was just a good time had between two friends. It was a way for him to get her out of his system, and likely the same was true for her as well.

But he felt something gnawing at him, something that said, '_this was a mistake._'

He moved the ashtray off his chest and onto the floor, closing his eyes, trying not to think.

* * *

><p>"My shipmates are going to give me hell. I always bitch at them for getting drunk during the day. They start acting stupid."<p>

"Fuck it. Just hang out here until you sober up," Neil said. "Or, better yet, keep drinking and sober up later." He pushed the bottle toward Jet.

Jet laughed. It seemed like it had been forever since he'd been able to cut loose like this.

"Tell me about them."

"I don't even know where to start," Jet said, pouring the final dregs of the scotch into his tumbler. "One of 'em is a chronic gambler who's likely to steal the shirt right off your body if you're not careful."

He threw back the rest of his drink.

"The other used to be all mixed up in a crime syndicate, and he's got a trail of bullshit a mile long following him at all times."

"Sounds like a real motley crew."

"I mean, don't get me wrong—I'm sure I'd take a bullet for either of them, but they've both got a way of grating on a man."

"You need to get yourself a new ladyfriend. Something to give troubles of your own."

The two men laughed rowdily, the alcohol amplifying their mirth.

"Seriously, though. What's stopping you? Alisa was the last woman I saw you with, and that was what, five years ago?"

Jet waved his hand. "Too much damn trouble."

"I hear ya. I started messing around this singer. Gorgeous blonde thing. Huge tits. She seemed totally cool, not catty or jealous or anything like that. She was all, 'yeah, yeah, I understand, you don't want anything serious' and then, BAM! I sleep with her once and she's telling me she loves me and she can't live without me and she's gonna kill herself if I leave her."

"How terrible your life is," Jet said, smirking over an unlit cigarette, cupping the flame and bringing it closer.

Neil shrugged. "What about the kid?"

"What about her?"

"Didn't you say you had a kid on the ship, too?"

"Not anymore," Jet said wearily. "That's who I'm looking for right now."

"Where is she?"

"I don't know. She ran off."

Drunken melancholy was beginning to surface as he spoke of Edward.

"I wish I coulda stopped her, but it didn't seem right. She's taken care of herself her whole life. She never needed us. We always needed her. Like now."

Jet was back to staring at the coffee table again, trying to work through in his mind just what the help was making him so miserable about her.

"I shouldn't've brought it up. I didn't know it was such a sore spot."

"Not your fault. Just nothing to be done about it, I guess."

"About what?"

"I don't even know," Jet said, perking back up, chuckling lightly. "I think it's the alcohol talking."

* * *

><p>"Were you sleeping?"<p>

"Eh, something like that."

"It's four in the afternoon."

"I was tired. What's up?"

"I won't be home until later. I'm gonna hang around and watch Neil play."

"Did he tell you what we were doing wrong?"

"Yeah. I'll tell you all about it."

"Alright. When will you be back so I can tell Faye?"

"I don't know. Midnight maybe."

"Alright. I'll talk to you later."

"Bye."

"Bye."

He shut off his comm. unit, tossing it on his pile of clothes. Faye had already pushed herself out of bed and was pulling on her dress.

Spike scratched his head, watching as she attempted to locate her underwear.

"Guess we should probably get around."

She nodded wordlessly, a distant look in her eyes as she bent to pull on her sandals.

"You alright?"

"Yeah, of course," she said, combing her fingers through her hair, pulling it up the same way she had earlier that morning when she awoke from her nap on the sofa. He realized as he watched her that it already felt like ages ago.

She came to stand beside him and he scooted over so she could sit on the edge of the bed.

"Today was fun, but I don't think we should do it again."

He smirked assuredly, "Probably a good idea."

She smiled back and then looked down at her hands, "It's just…"

"No need to explain. I was thinking the same thing myself."

She looked back up and they stared at each other silently for a moment. Despite their shared sentiments about future trysts, Spike was certain that nothing would ever be the same.

"Com'ere," he said lowly, intending to squeeze in a final moment of indulgence before she departed.

She leaned in to kiss him, their lips meeting heatedly, far more sensuously than their earlier encounter. His hands gripped both sides of her face as she fought to keep her balance.

He broke away abruptly.

"Maybe just one more time."

"Sure," she said, adamant in her agreement as he pulled her completely on top of him.

* * *

><p>AN: Don't drink, kids.<p> 


	17. Alcoholiday, Part 3

**A special shoutout to two of my favorite ladies—sidewalk serfer girl and brigidforest—without whom this story would not exist. This one's for you.**

* * *

><p><strong>Bad: Chapter 16<strong>

"_All I know is all I know  
>What I've done I leave behind me<br>I don't want my soul to find me__"_

- Teenage Fanclub

* * *

><p>Faye stood in the bathroom letting her body air-dry, her skin cool and clean after her shower, and began penciling on her lip liner for the second time that day. She leaned forward in the mirror, watching as her bare, pink mouth was transformed into its more seductive red twin. Her lips seemed more perfect than they'd ever been before as she took her time gliding the pencil carefully over their dips and curves.<p>

She supposed she should feel more ashamed that she always took whatever she wanted. There was something inherently wrong about it, something darker and more indecent than the act of taking itself, but somehow she never felt as guilty as society told her she should. Did it really matter that Spike hadn't been hers to take? He'd given himself away willingly, after all—not once, but twice.

Still, there was a feeling inside that she'd stolen something she should hurry to put back. She had absolutely no intention of taking it further than it has already gone, and maybe, that, she realized, was the problem. Perhaps if it had been under the pretense of a greater romantic advance it wouldn't have felt so selfish.

She dabbed her mascara wand on a tissue, removing the excess, and leaned in to the mirror again, stroking her lashes with the brush, staring back into her own wide eyes.

What was it that her mother used to say?

_You're prognosticating doom._

Faye hated it. It was such a stilted way of saying 'you're worrying too much.'

She bent over, flipping her hair upside down, combing it out with a big paddle hairbrush. When she rose to stand again, tossing her hair back in a self-conscious gesture of feminine guile and sexuality, she caught another glimpse of herself in the mirror.

It was her lips. The red looked unsettlingly deceptive now, the color an indictment of something she hadn't even known she'd done.

* * *

><p>Even as a master of the art, Spike was finding it hard to play cool. Perhaps it was the extended period of self-imposed celibacy, but the afterglow of their sexual encounter had yet to dissipate.<p>

He sat in the common area, waiting for Faye to finish getting ready, and when she walked in, he had to force himself not to look at her too much, not to smile at her knowingly. As she slipped on her bomber jacket and zipped it up halfway, he watched appreciatively as it cinched at the smallest part of her waist, right where his hands had gripped her as she rode him.

He continued to stare into the TV, his hands casually resting in his pockets, a cigarette dangling precariously from his lower lip.

When his eyes did shift to follow her, he found himself admiring the easiness of her presence, her effortless charm. It wasn't just that she was beautiful. Despite her brash attitude and brazen immodesty, she remained strangely delicate—as long as she didn't open her mouth. He would try to remember this moment the next time he felt the need to throttle her.

She finished gathering her things and gestured at him with a tilt of her head and a roll of the shoulders.

"Let's go."

* * *

><p>The evening was cold and the streets were quiet. There were very few cars or people, and the orange light from the streetlamps shone warmly on the empty stone sidewalks making them appear far more majestic and clean than they did in the harsh daylight.<p>

Perhaps it was a shared fear of what would transpire should they spend the rest of the day alone together, but they both agreed it was best to find Jet and see if they could drag him back to the ship sooner rather than later.

The club Neil played in was only a mile or two away, so despite the prickling pain in his thigh, Spike suggested they save themselves the hassle of undocking their ships and simply walk. But what he thought might be a pleasant stroll had developed into something oddly vacant.

Faye drifted along beside him, keeping a fair distance, staring into the dark windows of closed shops along the boulevard. A few times, when he turned to do the same, she would nonchalantly turn away.

Spike cursed himself. It had crossed his mind once or twice in his life that he seemed to lack the emotional maturity required to simply remain friends with a beautiful woman. Although he had only ever loved one woman, he easily developed radiant little fancies that burst suddenly inside of him when confronted with the presence of an attractive, mysterious female. Katerina, Electra, Faye. They were only a few of the names on the long list of ladies that captured his affection for a brief moment in time.

But Faye had transcended this. She'd forced herself into his life as a business partner and platonic roommate, making herself familiar to him by participating in quotidian routines like eating and working and sleeping, forcing him to be _comfortable_ with her—a comfort which now appeared he had disrupted by thinking with his dick.

As he contemplated this, the throb in his leg began to grow, as though the affliction in his mind sensed his physical infirmity and was attempting to undo him at his weakest spot.

He stopped in place, bending to massage his ravaged muscles and tendons.

"You gonna make it?"

"Yeah, give me a minute."

He sidled up the face of a seemingly high-end furniture boutique. Antique furniture always gave him the creeps. Faye came to stand in front of him, crossing her arms.

"I'm getting to be pretty lame, eh?"

A terse smile briefly twisted her mouth and her eyes fell to the ground.

"Maybe I'll head back. You can go on without me."

She rolled her eyes in an exaggerated way, moving to help him stand as he winced spasmodically. Tentatively, she slid an arm around his back, tucking herself under him for support, allowing him to sling his arm across her shoulder. She looked up at him, and he could swear there was a glimmer of a plea in her eye, but before he could be certain, she had turned away, starting them forward again.

"Thanks."

"You're not welcome."

He snorted, amused still by her dry wit.

"I bet Jet is piss drunk by now."

"Then I'm fucking leaving you both there. You can drag each other home."

* * *

><p><strong>END ACT I<strong>

* * *

><p>AN: I'll be taking a brief hiatus as I will be traveling next week.<p>

Thank you all for sharing this with me. I hope "Alcoholiday" didn't throw you too much for a loop; it was something I'd been planning for awhile—a bit of a story within a story—but I still knew it would come as a bit of a shock. I very much enjoy taking this journey with you guys.


	18. What's the Frequency, Kenneth?

**Bad: Chapter 17**

"_A smile like the cartoon, tooth for a tooth  
>You said that irony was the shackles of youth<br>You wore a shirt of violent green, uh-huh  
>I never understood the frequency, uh-huh<em>_"_

- REM

* * *

><p>In January, Edward spent her first birthday in almost a decade with her father. For a fourteen-year-old girl, a decade was a long time—practically her whole life.<p>

Of course, he hadn't remembered it was her birthday until a few days later, presenting her with a strangely-colored, lopsided cake, and a few days after that, he was gone yet again.

She really hadn't minded the look of the cake. It looked like something she would have made. She scooped out a handful for herself and another for Ein, each eating greedily, messily out of her dusky tanned palms.

This was the third time she and Ein had been left behind since she'd gone to find her father. They were usually able to catch up within a day or two, always heartily welcomed upon their arrival and questioned as to where they'd run off to.

But it had been weeks now, the trail having long grown cold, and she was darn tired. She and the dog spent many nights huddled together under a blanket, the wind and dust whooshing all around them, sleeping out in the open desert, nothing but hard rock to lay upon.

It didn't bother her any. Her tendency was toward a nomadic lifestyle, and now she had more than just her Tomato to keep her company.

Still, every now and then, she found herself in the same place for a time, something having drawn her in, a short-lived distraction from her endless travels.

This time it was an airplane.

It didn't look to be crashed, per se, because it was at least halfway intact and there was no apparent sign of lost life. Certainly, though, something had to have caused it to be downed out in the middle of a dried up seabed, half sunk into the ground.

They came upon it early one morning in the warm dawn light, she and Ein both looking at each other for a moment before racing across the cracked dirt toward the silvery jet jutting out from the ground like a piece of shrapnel dug under the skin of the earth. She held onto the straps of her backpack as her legs reeled freely beneath her, Ein scurrying alongside in her periphery, his tiny white legs doing their all to keep pace with the lanky teen.

Together they scaled the wing of the small aircraft, Ein climbing onto Ed's back so they could peek inside the dusty window together. They inspected it carefully, wary that something or someone might be living there. They crept around to the other side, which was open and half-missing, and climbed up to the jagged cliff of carpeted flooring.

A startled raven squawked loudly and sailed purposefully toward them, Edward ducking just in time to avoid the bird's ineffective attempt at intimidation. The plane was oddly clean and cozy, a small ten passenger private plane with two couches, no less.

It wasn't long before they found themselves curled up together on one of the sofas, the need for a home awakening inside yet again.

* * *

><p>"Whoops."<p>

Faye looked on in amazement as Jet slipped down the stairs leading into common area, his bottom thudding dully down each step, cackling wildly, slapping his knee in mirth once he finally hit the steel floor. Spike hopped down around him, spinning for moment on his good leg as he lifted the other to alleviate the pain from his thoughtless vault, leaving her to stand above them, watching as he attempted to pull an uncivil Jet to his feet.

Spike looked up at her and shrugged, his eyebrows rising in unison with his shoulders, his expression reading 'what can ya do?'

She pressed a palm to her forehead and groaned, a migraine twisting away in her temple.

After a few hours, two bottles of scotch, and a lot of 'remember whens', Jet knew he needed to sober up and get down to business.

That, however, was around 3pm.

Neil had talked him into swinging by the club for old-time's sake, and by the time they rolled into the Sonata Café at 8 o'clock, Jet figured he could treat himself to at least one or two more to smooth out the rough side effects of his morning bender. When Spike and Faye finally found him, he was halfway through a bottle of Wild Turkey, smacking his hand on the bar as Neil banged out a lively rendition of "Twistin' the Night Away."

"_C'mon,_ Jet," Faye whined, her face morphing into an excruciating visage of exhaustion and frustration.

Fortunately, despite his current state of utter ridiculousness and intemperance, Jet still possessed the mental wherewithal to know he was a burden to his shipmates.

"Just leave me here. I'll sleep on the couch."

Spike was immediately agitated by this prospect.

"That's probably a good idea," Faye said, rubbing her brow tiredly.

"But he'll be cranky in the morning," Spike whispered surreptitiously.

She hissed back violently "Well, I'm cranky _now_!"

Sighing, Spike slipped his hand under Jet's bicep as Jet planted his hand on the coffee table, aiding Spike in lifting him from the ground. He stood only for a moment before crashing face-first into the sofa.

"Night," he said into the cushions, slipping into unconsciousness.

"I guess that's another day gone to hell," Faye said, her voice detached as she stared distantly at Jet's motionless figure. "We only have a couple left…"

Spike watched her as she trailed off, fearful of the sudden despair that was overtaking her, having nothing to say in response.

* * *

><p>Within a few days, Edward and Ein had claimed the grounded jet as their own. At first, the birds dwelling there were perturbed and took to squawking endlessly in an attempt to ward off the girl and dog. However, after Edward began asking them questions about their feathers and seasonal flight habits with earnest curiosity, they seemed to sense that this creature was not like any they had ever encountered and found the courage to stay.<p>

At night, she and Ein would sit atop the nose of the plane, the cool metal stinging her bottom, and howl with the coyotes. During the day she would work on her latest project: a schemata that could be used to predict meteorite activity.

Perhaps it was fruitless endeavor, but it was her hope that if she could map the topographical changes to the Earth's surface before they occurred then her father would no longer need to travel globe, mapping the changes in real time. She was bright enough to know that this would not guarantee a more orthodox relationship with the man, but if it meant that he would stay in the same place for more than a day then she had to try.

* * *

><p>Spike touched his lips, the acrid, lingering smell of cigarettes permanently seeded into his fingertips. He couldn't recall a time when it wasn't there. He'd started smoking at age twelve, he and some of the other boys at the orphanage having stolen a pack of Dorals from the groundskeeper. The first time he'd tried one, he inhaled all wrong and ended up swallowing the smoke instead, giving himself a wicked stomach ache that lasted the whole afternoon.<p>

Despite having grown up an orphan, he was never lonely. All the other kids he knew were orphans too, so he really had no basis for comparison. Even when they would run off and loiter around the carousel park or the roller rink, they were always together, insulated by each other, shielded from the images happy families all around them. Well, mostly anyway.

No, it was Julia that had really made him understand loneliness. In her presence he felt a…oneness, a wholeness that no one else had ever come close to making him feel. And without her that wholeness turned to emptiness. He could never go back to feeling as he had before he'd met her. She'd created the void and only she could fill it.

Or so he'd thought. There were three people and a dog that had proven him wrong.

And for that, he knew he'd gotten lucky in a way all those other orphans probably never had.

But, still, at night, when he was alone, he felt the loneliness wrench inside him again.

Tonight, it was worse than it had been in ages. His mind began to recall with amazing clarity some of the tiniest details of their brief history—things that, unbeknownst to him, had dimmed with time. The warm, buttery color of her hair in the sunlight. The smoothness of her fingernails. The blue patterned linoleum of her kitchen floor. The bronze pocket watch that sat on her bedside table, tick, tick, ticking away. He suspected maybe it had been her father's, but he never asked.

He reached for his cigarettes and felt the sensation of a hair clinging to the fine down of his arm. He brushed his fingers down his forearm attempting to locate the offending strand, grasping it satisfyingly between this thumb and index finger, bringing it up to his eyes to examine.

Even in the dark he knew it was Faye's. Thick and straight and black.

So it begins.

* * *

><p>"Drink this."<p>

"What the hell is it?"

"Prairie oyster."

"No, thanks," Jet stated, repulsed, and pushed the glass toward Spike.

Spike slid it back forcefully. "Just drink it. It'll heal you up."

"The last time I took one of your home remedies I ended up passing out on the floor."

"Well, actually, I think that had more to do with you being bitten by that thing from the fridge."

Jet looked back at Spike, astonished by his flippancy on the subject.

"You mean that thing that attacked and nearly killed all of us because you forgot it was there."

"Yeah, that."

The corners of Spike's lips turned up slightly as Jet tilted his head in irritation.

"Are we ready to do this or what?" Faye's voice cut in as she entered the room.

"We were waiting for you."

"No, we were waiting for _you_, you lush."

Spike and Faye cast sideways glances at each other, sharing equally mischievous smirks. Jet always gave them hell for their irresponsible drinking binges.

Jet grimaced, disgraced by his juvenile behavior.

Spike leaned across the coffee table and tapped the computer, waking it from its sleep.

An expectant, weary silence overtook them as Jet scooted over, placing himself in front of the keyboard. He took a moment to adjust the re-position of the monitor and moved to pull the coffee table closer as well. Faye pushed herself up and down on the balls of her feet anxiously, willing him to get on with it. Spike felt her agitation and began to grow more impatient because of it.

A momentary flash of panic came over Jet as he realized with immaculate clarity the larger implications of what they were doing. What exactly would they be getting themselves into here? What would they be getting Edward into? How could he ask her to put herself in harm's way for them? She was just a kid. She didn't know what she was doing—not really, anyway.

He was torn. Torn between the selfish desire to fold their two wayward companions back into his life and keep them there forever and the impulse to push them as far away from this mess as he possibly could.

His began to shake as they hovered over the keys. He felt himself beginning to choke out the words 'I can't.' when Faye broke in.

"Jet."

He looked back at her inanely, having no idea what he was supposed to be doing.

"Do it."

* * *

><p>AN: If anyone can guess which movie character Neil is based on, I will…<p>

…be very impressed. Maybe I will figure out something nice to do for you guys. Like get on with this story.


	19. Private Universe

**Bad: Chapter 18**

"_I will run for shelter  
>Endless summer lift the curse<br>It feels like nothing matters  
>In our private universe<em>_"_

- Crowded House

* * *

><p>Edward woke in the morning and her thoughts went immediately to the ravens asleep in their nest.<p>

A hazy mist had crept into their sanctuary, the sun glinting off every tiny droplet hanging in the air as the morning blue turned into a tender gold. She lay quietly clutching Ein, his coat smooth yet coarse under her hands, watching the sleeping birds, their beaks tucked down into their glossy black feathers.

Birds were time-markers for Edward. Over the course of her travels, the inescapable sound of nature was her constant companion. Of all the sounds that could be heard in the wilderness, it was the sweet, high tones of the birds calling over the treetops that she remembered most. Each breed marked a time and place that she had once been, each song taking her back.

Kookaburras laughed. She'd first come across one in a dry, wooded area that proved as a welcome shelter from the late afternoon sun, and when its laugh cut shrilly through the silence of the desolate outback she was startled, at first mistaking it for a human laugh. She lowered herself to sit Indian-style in the brush—the aroma of soft, arid soil and foliage making her feel drowsy—and turned her head to the sky, listening intently for the return of the sound.

Her heart began to sink as she waited, her curiosity disappointed, alone once again.

She deliberated for a moment before letting out an uproarious, mirthful shriek, and soon found, much to her delight, that the bird had joined in. Its cackle only served to amplify her amusement, and moments later she was rolling in the dirt, hysteria having taken hold.

She spent the rest of the afternoon dancing through the forest, talking to the regal-looking black and white creature, shouting and singing and laughing. That night, she lay on her stomach in front of her Tomato, a campfire burning bright, looking happily at pictures of the tiny birds until she fell asleep. She decided that she was not a girl, she would have liked to be a Kookaburra.

A few days later, she spied over a garden fence a mother sitting out on her back porch, bouncing a toddler on her lap, singing cheerfully.

"_Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree  
>Merry, merry king of the bush is he<br>Laugh, Kookaburra  
>Laugh, Kookaburra<br>Gay your life must be"_

She looked on, the infant giggling in ecstasy, the mother holding her child with such love and joy.

Certainly it was better to be a bird than a girl.

* * *

><p>"Do it."<p>

Spike closely watched the tense exchange between Jet and Faye. His mouth opened to speak, but he said nothing, feeling completely dumbstruck.

On one hand, it was clear Jet was feeling very ambivalent and Spike respected his reticence. Jet was a man of great emotional depth, and his hesitation signaled to Spike that this matter was perhaps far more morally troublesome than either he or Faye, both so nonchalant in their selfishness, could truly grasp. On the other hand, this was the goal they had been devoting all of their energies toward, and it was the key to open all the gates that were now shut.

Faye had been coolly cunning in the pursuit of their plan thus far, but she was beginning to show signs of desperation, and Spike feared what might come of it.

Jet turned away from Faye's intent gaze, visibly defeated, and began to type slowly, forcing out the notes on the page.

Spike pushed himself up from the chair and came to stand behind Jet, in some way hoping that nothing at all would come of this, that they would find some way to live through this as they were meant to, allowing things to unfold with ordinary inevitability.

He watched as Jet tensely plodded through the notes, making the normally happy and upbeat song sound slow and weary.

His eyes turned to Faye. She was leaning forward, one hand on the back of the couch, her face grave. He saw the tiny shifts of emotion in her features, all of which read to him as some variation of fear or disappointment. On her back, there was a sliver of skin showing between where her jeans ended and her t-shirt began, and he wanted to touch her.

He had the urge to walk out the door and leave this all behind here and now. Abstractly, he felt certain there would be little objection to this, and it was as good a time as any. As if to test his theory, he took a few steps toward the door.

"Where are you going?" Her eyes bore into him angrily.

"Nowhere," he said, leaning into the door frame. He swore he heard her mutter the word 'chickenshit' under her breath.

The melody wound to a close, Jet's hands dropping from the keyboard.

A full five seconds of silence passed with no sign of anything at all.

Jet's deep voice came first, and Spike felt as though he hadn't heard it in years.

"Maybe I—"

In an instant, the whole computer screen began to swirl in on itself, the pixels twisting out of control until the shape of a cylinder emerged. They were soon staring into a tunnel that was churning violently, pulling all three of them in.

Spike didn't even realize he had moved back across the room until he felt Faye's hand grip his bicep. As if in a dream, his chin rotated toward her and he saw she was holding her other hand over her mouth breathlessly. Her grip on him loosened and her hand began to fall away, but he caught it in his own, squeezing it tightly and pulling it up toward his chest, feeling if he let go, she might disappear into the vortex of the screen.

The trio stood mesmerized by the surreal turn of events, but their collective cynicism was not enough to hold them there for long.

Faye jerked away from Spike who was immediately embarrassed by his impulsive, uninhibited behavior.

"What the hell is this? I don't understand."

Her voiced was bordering on frenzy as she rounded the sofa, pointing at the screen.

Jet was stupefied, his words falling from his mouth without much coherence. "Must be, like uh, a communication portal of some kind."

"You're telling me you've see a communication portal like _that_?" Her eyes flashed like vibrant shards of broken emerald. It was enough to snap Jet out of his trance.

"No. But she's a hacker. How the hell am I supposed to know what the fuck this thing is?!"

He stood as menacingly as a man of his ethics and virtue would allow. For Faye, it was hardly intimidating at all.

Spike frowned. He now had a good grasp on what it was like to live Jet's life. He rolled his eyes, reluctant to take on a role he was so ill-suited for.

"Calm down, goddamnit."

Faye cast her eyes toward her new target. She squared her jaw and rolled her eyes, a flurry of accusations beginning to take form on her lips. He caught her eye for a moment, and gave her his version of a pleading look. She exhaled forcefully, her mouth closing, and instead simply shook her head in disbelief.

He would have thanked her if it would not have incited a new fit of ire.

"Look, just let this thing run its course. I'll stay here. You two go cool off."

"I'll stay."

Jet and Spike traded knowing glances. Jet wanted to be here if and when Edward did appear. He wanted to be the first one to see her, to explain why they needed her help. Spike didn't think Jet would ever know just how much he respected him. Instead of telling him, Spike simply nodded and said okay.

Faye stood silently, one hand on her hip, looking down at the floor, clearly still feeling indignant but also guilty. Her behavior was worthy of reproach and she knew it. She threw back her shoulders as if shrugging off all that had just transpired and moved to leave, brushing past Spike.

"I'll go get some food."

Jet rubbed his face ponderously, knowing her clipped tone was a preview of a future outburst. Spike held up his hand, his indication that he would take care of the problem, and turned on heel to follow.

* * *

><p>Faye was standing in the hangar pulling on her leather gloves when Spike stepped around the Redtail.<p>

"What do you want, Spike?"

"I know this is important to you, but you shouldn't blame Jet if it doesn't go the way you planned. He's just trying to help."

"Then I suppose I should blame you instead?"

He smiled humorlessly, his lips pursed.

"What shitty, horrible thing have I done to piss you off now?"

She looked sideways at him through the fringe of her bangs.

"Don't ever do that again."

"Do what?" he asked, genuinely ignorant of his misdeed.

"You know what."

He shrugged his shoulders and frowned animatedly, his hand dug in his pockets, shaking his head.

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, whatever."

She moved to open the door to her ship. He reached out to stop her, his fingers brushing hers where they gripped the opened hatch. The contact lasted barely a millisecond before she snatched her handed away, just as she had done earlier.

"Oh, that."

"Yeah, that."

"You know, I seem to remember your trembling feminine fingers gripping my hard, manly bicep first."

She couldn't help but let the corners of her mouth creep up slightly, realizing the absurdity of her anger as she looked down at the floor. He smiled slightly too as he watched her, glad that she was able to appreciate his attempt at levity.

"I'm just not used to that."

"There's nothing to get used to. Won't happen again."

She nodded resolutely.

"Unless you wanted it to."

"Spike…"

For the last twenty-four hours Spike had hardly been able to think of anything else—which, in turn, had led him to the realization that for the last _few weeks_ he had hardly been able to think of anything else. As far as he was concerned, after yesterday, he had made her his and no one else's. If it sounded Cro-Magnon of him, well, he couldn't say different.

"It's just an open offer. Nothing more, nothing less."

"I thought we agreed that was a bad idea," she stated coyly, crossing her arms.

"When have you ever known me to do the smart thing?" he asked, flicking up one of his eyebrows for dramatic emphasis.

"I think you should know," she looked up at him, breathing coolly. "Regardless of what happens with Edward, I'm planning on going away for awhile. It won't be until after all this bullshit settles, but after that, I'm going."

"For awhile?"

"For a long while."

"All the more reason then, right?" he stated slickly, stepping in closer.

Even he was surprised at how quickly his wit responded.

Perhaps it was that Faye's presence was never a guarantee at any point in the whole time that he had known her, or perhaps it was because he had a knack for performing his greatest feats in the moments when circumstances were their most bleak. Had her confession been anything less alarming, he may have been equally less convincing.

She wanted to object, wanted to point out that since she was leaving there was no point in getting attached, but his flippant response extinguished her concern. Maybe there was no risk in that for him at all.

A tear threatened to creep out of her eye, so she turned away quickly, climbing into her ship.

"I'll think about it."

And with that she pulled the hatch closed after her.

Spike walked toward the control panel on the wall and pressed the button to open the loading gate, watching as the dark, dusty hangar slowly filled with light. He stepped out onto the deck, allowing Faye room to start her engine. He followed her progress as she hovered and guided her zipcraft out of the door, all the while feeling as if someone had just punched him in the gut. He could see her through the glass of the control pod as she emerged, but she did not turn to look at him before tearing away into the afternoon sky.

* * *

><p>AN: My apologies for the slowing of my tempo. Edward is very difficult to write. The first half of this chapter took me weeks whereas the second part took me only a few hours. Anyhow, onward and upward.<p> 


	20. The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game

**Bad: Chapter 19**

"_What's this whole world coming to?  
>Things just ain't the same<br>Any time the hunter gets captured by the game"_

- The Marvelettes

* * *

><p>'Going to get food' was actually Faye's tacit code for 'going to the bar.' She knew she wouldn't be missed for awhile anyhow.<p>

Her drink has been sitting in front of her untouched for nearly an hour, but she couldn't seem to conjure up the desire to consume it. The sun was beginning to set and the color of the amber liquid was made even richer by the rays of orange light pushing in through the lower third of the bar windows that were mostly covered with roller shades.

Despite how monumentally crappy she was feeling, there was a part of her which refused to let go of her present misery, refused to dilute the acute, exquisite pain brought on by her exchange with Spike in the hangar.

She felt a hand on her shoulder.

"You alright there? You ill?"

One of the bartenders had snuck up behind her—the tall one with the curly, graying ponytail threaded through the back of his black ball cap.

"I'm fine, thanks."

"You look like you've got a bowling ball tied around your neck, you're navel-gazin' so hard."

"Bowling ball, no. Albatross, maybe."

He hopped up onto the stool next to her.

"How's that?"

"Oh, no. No way," she stated adamantly, laughing.

"What?"

"I'm not going to sob to a bartender."

"I guess it's a bit of a cliché."

"Yes, it most definitely is. Shouldn't you be avoiding this kind of thing like the plague?"

"Normally, I suppose I would."

"So what makes me different?"

"Well, for one thing, whatever's eating you is eating you so bad you can't even bring yourself to drink your sorrows away. Having you sitting down here, sober as a judge, it's like bad press for alcohol."

She snorted, appreciating the candor, and lit a cigarette.

"You own this place?"

"Yes, ma'am. Been here every day for the last twenty-two years."

"Every day?"

"Every day."

"Then shouldn't you know by now that I'm too young to be called 'ma'am'? It's not exactly a flattering form of address for a girl in her twenties."

"Just my way of showing a lady respect."

He sat sideways on the stool, both of his arms bent at the elbow, his hands clasped in front of him, one thin bicep pressing into the bar at his side, the other pressing into the back of the barstool, keeping him centered and steady as he faced her. His zen pose made him feel strangely familiar.

"I'm not much of a lady."

"Well, it won't keep me from treating you like one."

"That's a first."

"We're not all flesh-hungry monsters."

She pushed back the hair that had fallen into her eyes, shaking her head.

"Spare me. Even if a man believes that, when push comes to shove his virtue rarely extends beyond his manhood."

"That's a pretty rough way to go through life."

She cast her eyes back down at her lap.

"It's all I've ever known."

"Then why's it troubling you so much now?"

"Who says that's my problem? Maybe I just found out I have brain-eating parasites or something."

The bartender laughed, his face becoming even craggier in the process, and pushed himself down off his stool.

"I only ever saw one other person come in here and refuse to drink their drink. Couple of years ago, this guy would come in almost every night and just sit in the corner, always order a whiskey, but he never drank it. Just sat there in the corner and stared at it, just the same as you're doing right now."

"And?"

"Well, I never did get his whole story, but after awhile, hearing him talk a bit here and there, I put it together that he was probably in love with someone who didn't love him back."

Faye's lips came together in a thin line, the ugly truth of the matter sounding so common yet so poignant on the tongue of a stranger.

He reached up to pat her shoulder once again, and she got the feeling that while his sympathy was genuine, this was truly a ritual that had long since lost its gravitas. She wondered briefly if she had disappointed him with such a garden-variety barstool story.

"Don't beat yourself up. Even foxes get outfoxed. And drink that drink. You'll feel better."

She sighed to herself, hearing the words in her mind.

_He was probably in love with someone who didn't love him back._

She turned to the window, the sun having skated off beyond the horizon, leaving behind only a faint trail of violet to remember it by.

There was nowhere left to run to now. It was the irrefutable truth.


	21. Nightbirds

AN: I've upped the rating due to some suggestive language. Please take heed.

* * *

><p><strong>Bad: Chapter 20<strong>

"_And nightbirds sing you  
>An empty tune<br>In an empty house  
>In an empty room<br>In an empty moment  
>All the nightbirds sing<br>We were supposed to rise above  
>But we sink<br>Into the ocean"_

- Ryan Adams

* * *

><p>After Faye had departed, Spike stood out on the deck for a long while, not quite yet wanting to return to the common area where he assumed he would again become befuddled and agitated. Not that that was entirely different than what he was feeling right now. Still, the blow Faye had dealt him was fresh enough that it was not yet totally wearisome to think about, whereas this thing with Edward was beyond exhausted.<p>

Two cigarettes later, he passed back into the shady hangar, turning the corner to the control board, and slammed his fist down on the button to close the loading gate.

Why couldn't one single thing in his life be uncomplicated? Surely this was how he'd come upon his mantra about women, children, and pets in the first place. They were all entirely too unpredictable.

He climbed the stairs back up to the main corridor, hoping Jet would accept a two-minute status check and let him off with that. Much to his surprise, when Spike entered the common area and began to assure Jet that he'd dealt with Faye, Jet only grunted in reply, clearly brushing him off in favor of focusing singularly on the as yet unchanged communication portal.

He attempted to shrug it off, aware of Jet's tendency to worry terribly, but still it was unnerving.

For lack of anything better to do, he headed to his room to change into his training pants, deciding to try out some physical therapy of his own. For some reason he was very bothered by the idea of limping into this meeting with the ISSP. Either because it was a concession of weakness or of wrongdoing; he hadn't yet figured out which.

He made it halfway through his normal workout routine before he found himself too fatigued to continue. He threw himself at the workout bench that was now a permanent fixture on the bridge. Puffing lightly, he sat with his head dropped, elbows on his knees, his arms crossed at the wrist, hands dangling limply.

This had all happened way too fast. But then, that was sort of his way. Perhaps if he spent a little more time considering the consequences of his actions he wouldn't be an ex-syndicate hood with a fake eye, scraping by on next to nothing, with certain doom lingering in his near future. And maybe Julia wouldn't have had to die.

He reached up and massaged his eyelid, feeling the overly firm implant underneath.

The future. It was never a concept he'd been terribly keen on. It seemed to him that people who spent a lot of time planning for their future were often too scared to live in the present; that their hope for what their life might be left them with acute anxiety about those hopes being disappointed.

But much like the past, the future had caught up with him. Now he was _forced_ to think about it, what he wanted out of it, what he hoped it might be. It was horribly draining.

Maybe it was best for Faye to leave. Then he wouldn't have to feeling guilty about hurting her feelings more than he already had.

She had a solid poker face, but he knew all of her tells by now. He'd seen the trace of melancholy in her features brought on by his tactless remark. It bothered him for a number of reasons, chiefly because he truly hadn't meant to upset her. Heretofore, she appeared to be genuinely resistant of his charms. How was he to know his self-preserving artifice would elicit such a response?

He wiped away the quickly cooling sweat from the back of his neck.

Even more unnerving was the twinge of victory he felt at seeing tremble in her lips and the flicker of vulnerability in her eyes. If he could hurt her then that could only mean she wasn't quite as immune as she wanted him to believe. The mere fact that this thought had occurred to him, that he'd felt some excitement at the prospect that there was something inside her to be exploited, that was what disturbed him most of all.

Just how far was he willing to allow this to go? He wanted her, yes, and despite his better judgment, he could admit that he liked her. Actually, he liked her a lot—he always had, but that was beside the point. The point was that when she wasn't trying to grift him, she was annoying the ever-loving piss out of him somehow. Certainly, there were moments in between that reached beyond that, especially of late. Moments of genuine, albeit mostly accidental companionship and understanding. When she'd confronted him in that corridor, something in him had _wanted_ to tell her about his past. Not just anyone. Her. She was perhaps the only person in his life that could understand the bitterness and confusion and all the other feelings he'd tried so long to outrun, if only because she had never been successful in outrunning them herself.

He had a desire that only she seemed capable of satisfying, but beyond that, he couldn't really say what she meant to him. She was a friend, a real friend, and that alone was a lot.

His hands began to tingle almost painfully as he began to recall the sensations of their encounter. The feeling of his palms cradling her face and neck, her firm yet fragile shoulders, her warm mouth, the ache of his own body as he moved inside her. Her knowing smile, the one where she bit the corner of her bottom lip, as she undid the buckle of his belt.

He stood quickly, trying to shake off the thrall of his own senses, and moved to stand before the glass windows that lined the bridge, the coolness of the night emanating from them. If he didn't look too far one direction or the other, Spike could almost fool himself into believing that the dark ocean was surrounding him on all sides. There was something both freeing and terrifying by the prospect.

No, she had to stay. Maybe he was crazy, but the future seemed dimmer without her around.

* * *

><p>As soon as she emerged from the trees, Edward could hear the steady chirping of her Tomato. She was over 100 yards away from the plane, but the vast openness of the desert carried the sound far and wide.<p>

Her excitement was immediate, and she tore toward the jet at a dead sprint, leaving Ein to follow her in surprised terror.

She had no idea what would be awaiting her there, but that in and of itself was reason enough for such enthusiasm. Their sabbatical had been pleasant and restful, but was also lacking in some much needed color. She'd always been able to entertain herself, but something about her days on the Bebop had left her with a feeling of unsatisfied anticipation—a desire for adventure beyond what her travels was able to provide. The stimuli that came with solving puzzles and riddles as a bounty hunter had yet to be replicated in her new life.

She practically vaulted into the belly of the jet, throwing herself up the rungs of the ladder she'd constructed from thick, woody vines.

Could it be her father was seeking her out at last?

She could see lights stirring under the thin blanket she used to conceal her Tomato whenever she ventured out. She threw it aside, a swirl of shimmering dust trailing the fabric as it sailed sublimely into the shadowy chamber where the ravens nested.

**INCOMING REQUEST  
>HOSTNAME: BEBOP<br>PORT: 100  
>SESSION DURATION: 02H 05M 11S<br>GRANT ACCESS: Y / N**

This was…unexpected.

Edward moved in to study the prompt further, almost unable to believe her eyes. Something here was amiss.

Upon moving onto the ship, it didn't take long for her to figure out that the Bebop's system was more than a little outdated. The old fishing boat has been brilliantly fashioned into a fairly modern interplanetary aircraft, but most of its protocols operated on software builds that were developed before she could even type.

Not long after she had overhauled the security protocols, she began to develop a truly stable, private communication portal which would allow her to network with the Bebop securely no matter where she was. It was a pretty straightforward process with one exception: trace transmissions could still be picked up through digital-to-analog converters. For close proximity communication, this was not likely to be an issue— D-to-A converters were few and far between these days, especially in populated regions. However, long range communication would surely be intercepted by at least one converter, should anyone be listening, as the transmissions were far more likely to pass through a more remote region somewhere between the origin and destination.

She'd never finished developing the system, because, well…she'd never really planned on leaving. The issue at hand was that she'd never mentioned its existence to anyone. Their normal communication portal was secure _enough_ for everyday use. After all, they were just bounty hunters.

This request was, therefore, quite troubling.

She looked back and forth between the screen and Ein, who was looking up at her with a strangely hominal expression.

Her mouth twisted curiously as she considered the situation further.

She quickly struck 'N' on the keyboard, provoking a short, sudden whimper from Ein.

**ACCESS DENIED**


	22. Little Bird

**Bad: Chapter 21**

"_Little bird  
><em>_Hoppin' on my porch  
><em>_I know it sounds kinda sad  
><em>_But what's it all for?  
><em>_Right now you're the only friend I have in the world  
><em>_And I just can't take how very much  
><em>_Goddamn  
><em>_I miss that girl"_

- The Eels

* * *

><p>Jet was convinced that this portal was sucking his soul right the fuck out of him.<p>

His eyeballs were aching and burning and he wanted to pull away, but he couldn't stop himself. He was horribly and hopelessly lost.

This child, this sweet innocent thing, the only pure soul he'd encountered in this trash heap of a galaxy was just a few blips and bleeps away, and the melancholy of such an insinuation was shredding his insides to pieces. And this thing, this tenebrous, awful _hole_ was the only door through which he could reach her. Sickening is what it was.

In the thousands of hours and minutes that had passed since Edward's departure, he'd learned that not only could he not teach himself to stop worrying about her, but also that she may have been his only hope for some salvation in this life.

Only Edward could save them from this meandering misery and mediocrity.

Even still, it wasn't her burden to bear, and he'd be damned if he let their failings land on her shoulders. She had no way of really knowing how deep it all went.

But what could he do? Nothing. Not a goddamn fucking thing. He was as useless to her as he had been to Spike when he'd returned to the ship, standing over him as he slept, in the darkest hour of the night. All he could do was cook the condemned his final meal and watch him march into oblivion. Jet didn't have the brass to try to question fate the way Faye did. She was a survivor—the only one of the three of them who was brave enough to fight that which he and Spike accepted to be inevitable, to try to spin the wheel of fortune in her favor.

Who was he to interfere? It was she who had kept pulled them through the bedlam when the sky caught fire and rained down the scorching ruins of their wasted lives.

But still, the panic wouldn't leave him. He wanted so badly to blame her, to blame Spike. It was him she was helping after all. He wanted to curse them both for their insane self-regard. Instead, he simply sat on his worn-down sofa in his rusty ship and let the uncertainty and dread push in on him from all sides.

* * *

><p>"It's time for bed, love."<p>

"I know, babe."

Madeline Houten leaned on the back of her husband's chair.

"You know, but here you sit."

Miles turned his head up to look at her. She frowned lightly. Small wrinkles were starting to form at the corners of her mouth. He didn't mind.

* * *

><p>When he'd met her she'd been Maddy Nichols, co-captain of the equestrian team, ever-present headband simultaneously securing and taming her elegant oaken curls as she serenely tread through along the brick walkways between campus halls. He studied her intently in their British literature class when he should have been studying Brontë.<p>

Much like the trained thoroughbreds she galloped upon, she was a female of excellent breeding. She exuded class at a level that could easily be mistaken for snobbery. Despite his attraction to her, even Miles was willing to concede she was probably an uptight bitch. He would only find out later that her aloof detachment from her peers held far greater meaning than could be explained by common arrogance.

However, it would be many years before he would be allowed to witness, to experience all she held inside. In retrospect, he was able to reconcile that the ill feelings and fear that seized him in her presence were truly nothing greater than the result of being shown his own self in the reflection of her divine, simple purity, which was fortified by her unimpeachable rank and the prestige of her family's incontestable wealth. While he had grown up in a wood-framed foursquare, she had been raised in a Tudor revival. In his mind, not a single thing about him could possibly enhance her already sublime existence.

Naturally, it was his duty as an impudent proletariat male to drunkenly inform her of his conclusion.

He'd been sitting in the waiting area of the diner near campus that all the students frequented. It was 1:00am and he was inebriated at a level which he'd found he was far more vulnerable to melancholy—it resided somewhere between 4 and 5 scotches.

His friends at his side were in far better place, loudly joking, bothering the frenzied hostess with their obnoxious behavior.

It was then that she appeared.

"Hey, Maddy!"

Miles' friend Charlie, the least self-aware member of their tribe, beckoned her over. She'd been heading either to or from the ladies room; he was too dazed to know which.

She stood before them, looking perfectly put-together even at this late hour, her crisp navy slacks and striped sweater more appropriate for a lunch at the country club than a late-night meal at a greasy spoon. Miles admired the way the slim, brown leather band of her watch accentuated the daintiness of her small wrist.

"Hi, Charlie."

"Maddy, dear, what brings a girl like you to a place like this?"

"The same thing that brings _all_ of the other students here—coffee and conversation." She knew very simply and astutely the larger implications of his remark and was having none of it.

"You shouldn't sully yourself by associating with riff-raff like us. You, my darling, are a lovely rose, and we are but ragweed. Persistent, but pedestrian, and the cause of much sneezing."

"Poetic, but a bit droll for my taste."

Charlie stood theatrically, sliding his arm around her waist, pulling her close to him in an unoffending way.

"My point is made! We are but jesters in your noble court!"

Maddy leaned back, avoiding the vapors of alcohol following Charlie's every word.

"Now, if you do not mind, I would appreciate it if you would save my seat while I take a piss."

Gaily shoving off with one foot, Charlie departed, leaving Miles to stare up at a somewhat bemused and befuddled Madeline Nichols.

She slid her hands down the back of slacks, smoothing them in a truly lady-like fashion as she took Charlie's open seat next to Miles. He became instantly nervous, and sobered considerably for it. However, his melancholy persisted.

"He certainly makes no attempt to hide his opinions."

"Yeah, he should learn to shut up sometimes."

"I appreciate the candor. I often get the feeling others wish to share similar sentiments, but they don't."

"I wouldn't take it personally. People just get intimidated is all."

"I suppose I understand on one hand. On the other, I can't say I'm not disappointed."

"How's that?"

"Everybody looks at me like I'm an alien."

"Well, you sort of are."

She tried to take it in stride.

"My parents were upset that I chose to enroll in a public university, but it was important to me. I didn't want to continue living in such an insular world where everything was so goddamn…palatable." She made a face at this last word.

Miles was as surprised by her blaspheme as he was appreciative of her extraordinarily reasonable perspective. Still, his sullen, affronted ego was not willing to let her off so easily.

"How are you enjoying your time slumming it with the common people then?"

She cast him a sideways look. "Fine, I guess."

"You guess?"

A fragile smile began to form, a soft and special shifting of her innocent features. She tilted her head and her lips parted, as though to force the words she was holding to move. He wanted to be charmed by it, and he was, but he was certain anything that such a gesture might have meant to suggest could never have been intended for him. It hurt so damn bad. He couldn't help but take it personally.

"Why'd you come here?"

"My friends and I…"

"Not here." He gestured. "_Here._"

She looked at the floor. "I just told you, I…"

"You know, I think your friends probably miss you by now."

"Oh…Okay."

She rose rigidly, and looked only ahead, into her exquisite and uncomplicated future, as she left him sitting in the alone and went back to her table, somewhere out of sight.

* * *

><p>Days of agony followed. He woke every morning feeling run down, his mind spinning even in his sleep.<p>

He wanted only to be able to crawl inside her mind, to live inside her thoughts, which were surely so fully-formed and not at all a mess like his own, thoughts which he knew so little about and now never would.

He wanted to be someone else, somewhere else. When was it, he wondered, walking down through the cemetery during winter break, the sky and grass and headstones all the same colorless hue, that he'd begun to hate himself so much?

Despite how much his very being pleaded, so loudly that he swore there was no way she could not have heard it, she gave him no reprieve. She did not acknowledge him again, soon the semester had ended, and they did not share a single class for the rest of their undergraduate careers.

The following autumn, she did not return, and never did again.

He knew he was being a little dramatic, but he was convinced, after thousands of hours of solitary deliberation, that he'd just changed the course of his life for the worse.

* * *

><p>AN: Let's pray I can keep this going.<p> 


End file.
